Visitors to the Durango Botanical Gardens now may take self-guided garden tours using a phone app.

Former Durango Botanical Society Executive Director Cindy Smart built the app to engage tourists who cannot attend a formal guided tour.

She also expects the app to help engage younger residents to visit and spend time in the garden.

Smart has often had to accommodate last-minute requests for tours from visitors, and she hopes the app will help keep docents from getting overwhelmed, she said.

The app provides detailed information about ecosystems and individual plants. By the fall, she expects the app will detect a visitor’s location in the garden and provide information about the plants at that location.

The app also provides a phone number so visitors can call a member of the society if they have questions.

Smart also is developing games for the app that would help children learn new vocabulary and interact with the garden, she said.

“The whole idea of public gardens is to encourage other generations to take part in enjoying and protecting them,” she said.

mshinn@durangoherald.comAn earlier version of this story gave an incorrect name for Durango Botanical Gardens.