Horticulturalist Brenda Blackmore said the annual display in the Alf Headland Conservatory included 70 varieties with 12 cascades.

Ms Blackmore said the begonia display had first started in 1885 by a Frenchman, W Gascoigne and had been resurrected in the 1930s and again in the 1950s by Mr Headland.

Mr Headland, who worked at the gardens from 1956 to 1978, created his display after finding just two tubulars in an old woodshed.

Some of the descendants of his original plantings were still on display today, Ms Blackmore said.

"Every year we take cuttings and also purchase new stock," she said.

Ms Blackmore said begonias bloomed from March to May with the flowers at their peak over the Labor Day long weekend.