Stepanavan Dendropark
Stepanavan Dendropark, officially Sochut Dendropark named after Edmund Leonowicz, is an arboretum near Gyulagarak village in Lori Province, Armenia, about 85 km north of Yerevan. It was founded in 1931 by Polish forester Edmund Leonowicz.
The park covers 35 hectares, with 17.5 ha of natural forest and 15 ha of ornamental trees. New paths and viewpoints expanded into the forest, turning part of the natural forest into a forest park and making it one of the first places in the Transcaucasus to reshape a natural landscape into a park.
Today there are more than 500 introduced plant species. Specimens came from botanic gardens around the world through exchanges with gardens in Tbilisi, Kyiv, Nikitsky, Leningrad and Moscow, plus partners in Germany, France, Portugal, China and the United States. The park features deciduous forest and ornamental plantings, with lime avenues and species of Juglans, Malus, Populus and Pyrus. It also houses Magnolia, Larix decidua, various cypresses, Pinus sibirica, Cryptomeria japonica and Sequoiadendron giganteum. Native plants include Carpinus caucasica, Tilia dasystyla and T. cordata, Fagus orientalis, Ulmus species, Quercus species, Pinus sylvestris var. hamata and Pyrus communis. Armenia is known for its diverse pears.
The arboretum tested about 2,500 plant taxa to see if they could grow here; about 500 survived. Seeds from the park spread worldwide via Index Seminum from the Yerevan Botanical Garden. Plants from the former Soviet Union, China, Western Europe and North America also contribute to the collection.
Today the park is open to the public, scientists and eco-tourists. It offers a chance to study how plants adapt to local conditions, hosts student programs, and helps people learn about the Transcaucasus flora. Admission is free.
This page was last edited on 2 February 2026, at 23:09 (CET).