St Petersburg's Botanical Gardens is run as part of the Vladimir Komarov Botanical Institute of the Russian Academy of Science. They are some of the oldest botanical gardens in Russia having been founded by Peter the Great in 1714 as a herb garden for medicinal plants. Today the gardens consist of a park, which is partly organised as an English Garden, and 25 green houses, one of which features a pond with water lilies. A famous attraction is the Queen of the Night cactus which flowers just one night of the year sometime in June or July. The site's museum also contains many collections of plants as well as displays on botany. As it is part of an educational institute, the museum (but not the gardens) is closed in July and August.