A stone’s throw from central Jokkmokk lies the Mountain Garden, Jokkmokk’s own arctic garden that stands as a flourishing oasis along the rushing Kvarnbäcken stream just south of Lake Talvatis. King Karl’s Scepter, mountain avens, and glacier buttercup are just a few of the many mountain plants that thrive here. During summer, the Mountain Garden is open daily.
“It feels like I’m walking in Carl von Linnaeus’s footsteps when I work here, says Ingrid Hellberg, who has been working as a gardener in the Mountain Garden since 2010.
Ingrid originally comes from Hälsingland and is passionate about developing the Mountain Garden. A new “mountain peak” has been created to provide even more space for plants that thrive in an alpine biotope, and the Mountain Garden, which is part of the Ájtte Mountain and Sami Museum, has over two decades developed into a miniature world containing many of the ecological niches found in the Arctic region, including marshland, mountain heath, taiga forest, reindeer grazing heath, willow thickets, and bare mountain terrain.
“It takes a long time to shape the garden, explains Ingrid.
“The bare mountain terrain has been a challenge that we’ve worked on for a long time. I got inspiration from the low mountain Jarre, from which you can see fantastic views. On the mountain peak we’ve created, you can see plants that normally grow in Sarek, she continues.
When we visit the mountain garden in mid-June, the glacier buttercup (ranunculus glacialis) is in bloom, a small modest flower adapted to arctic climate and growing at high altitudes in the Alps, Carpathians, Sierra Nevada, Iceland, Svalbard, and Greenland. It also holds the Scandinavian altitude record and has been found at 2,055 meters on Kebnekaise and 2,370 meters on Galdhøpiggen.
The Mountain Garden also features many utility plants that have been used in various ways throughout history.
“Nature is full of edible plants, explains Ingrid.
Angelica and mountain sorrel are two examples of plants that have been used in various ways, both as food and for other purposes. Angelica has been used for medicinal purposes, and smoking dried angelica leaves in pipes was previously popular among children. Angelica is one of our oldest documented utility plants and is mentioned in the Icelandic sagas.
The Mountain Garden also houses Axel Hamberg’s Tjågnori Cabin. Hamberg, who was a professor of geography at Uppsala University, developed building techniques in the early last century to construct five lightweight but weather and wind-resistant cabins in the Sarek Mountains. The Tjågnori Cabin was originally built in 1912 and was bequeathed after Hamberg’s death to the Royal Academy of Sciences, which later transferred it to the Environmental Protection Agency. In 1967, the Tjågnori Cabin was moved to Jokkmokk and can now be viewed in the Mountain Garden.
“In it, you can see the special building technique that Hamberg developed at the beginning of the last century – a framework covered inside and out with galvanized metal sheets, explains Ingrid.