Qualla: Botanical Garden and Zoo of Asunción

Botanical Garden and Zoo of Asunción: Introduction

Sun, 21 Jun 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Iwan, CC BY-SA 3.0. The trees here remember a dynasty. Spread across 110 hectares of natural forest on the northern edge of Asunción, the Botanical Garden and Zoo grows on ground that once belonged to Carlos Antonio López, who ruled Paraguay from 1842 to 1862 and built his country house, the Casa López, on this land in the 1840s. The López family were the closest thing Paraguay had to royalty, and this was their private retreat. Today their estate is one of the capital's great green lungs, where towering native trees more than 150 years old throw shade over visitors and nearly seventy species of animals draw families through the gates. A presidential garden became a public one.

Image: Iwan | CC BY-SA 3.0

Botanical Garden and Zoo of Asunción: From Dynasty to Bank to Garden

Sun, 21 Jun 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Chris Gladis from Kyoto, Japan, CC BY 2.0. The land passed through hands that trace Paraguay's history. After Carlos Antonio López died, his estate eventually moved beyond the family, and in 1896 his descendants sold it to the state-owned Agricultural Bank. The old Casa López still stands, so representative of its era in ...

Image: Chris Gladis from Kyoto, Japan | CC BY 2.0

Botanical Garden and Zoo of Asunción: The Botanist and the Woman in the Garden

Sun, 21 Jun 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Beacazal, CC BY-SA 4.0. The garden as we know it was the work of two scientists in love with this land. The German botanist Karl Fiebrig first came to Paraguay collecting plants and insects for European museums, settled there in 1910, and in 1914 transformed the López estate into a botanical garden and ...

Image: Beacazal | CC BY-SA 4.0

Botanical Garden and Zoo of Asunción: A Zoo Ahead of Its Time

Sun, 21 Jun 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit TimVickers, Public domain. Fiebrig and Gertz built their zoo on an idea that was radical for 1914. Rather than caging animals in bare enclosures, they tried to house them in settings as close as possible to their natural habitat, a philosophy that would not become standard practice in the wider world for m...

Image: TimVickers | Public domain

Botanical Garden and Zoo of Asunción: Exile and Endurance

Sun, 21 Jun 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit JJ Harrison, CC BY-SA 3.0. Even paradise was not immune to the politics outside its hedges. Fiebrig went on directing the garden and zoo for years, was named head of Paraguay's Department of Agriculture in 1934, and built a Cotton Institute whose funds helped sustain the grounds. Then history turned agains...

Image: JJ Harrison | CC BY-SA 3.0