Circulation Privileges
Books may be checked out by Arboretum members for three weeks at a time, plus an additional two renewals if needed. Items may be renewed in person, by phone, or by email. Current and some non-current magazines may be checked out as well, with no renewals. Please be sure to have your Membership Card with you. Learn more about becoming a member of the Arboretum.
The Arboretum Library houses more than 20,000 books with a particular emphasis on plants grown in the Mediterranean and semi-tropical climates.
• More than 20,000 books in open stacks, accessible through the online catalog
• Children's books are housed separately in a space for children and their caregivers.
• Fiction - explore mysteries and more with plant related themes
• Oversized books, reference works and some other groups housed separately
• Rare book collection housed separately - books retrieved for viewing on request
• New books are on the racks on the front of the book stacks for easy browsing.
• Over 6,500 e-books accessible through the online catalog for Arboretum members.
The Arboretum Library contains a comprehensive collection of resources on gardening, botany,
Subjects include, but not limited to:
Visitors interested in locating sources of garden plants have access to more than 200 current retail, wholesale, and equipment catalogs. There are also archival catalog holdings useful to researchers in horticultural history as well as historic house home owners.
This collection includes nearly 100 current magazine subscriptions, as well as 500 non-current or out-of-print titles, covering botany, popular gardening, plant society magazines, green industry magazines and magazines from other botanic gardens.
*Pamplets - A variety of pamphlets are integrated into the books stacks with bibliographic entries in the card catalog.
*Slides - The William Aplin slide collection contains 7,000 images of plants, landscapes and the Arboretum taken from the 1940s to the 1980s. The plant slides are searchable in electronic format in BG-BASE through the Curator of Plant Collections. Contact the librarian.
*Los Angeles County Arboretum and Botanic Garden Plant Collection Lists. *Lists are arranged by genus, family, accession number and Arboretum location.
*CDs, videos and DVDs.
*Historical photograph collection - Over 1,000 historical photographs of the Arboretum and environs including "Lucky" Baldwin ranch pictures as well as movies and television programs filmed here.
