NATIONAL GARDENING WEEK
3rd week of October each year
National Gardening Week is celebrated in October each year, so what better excuse do you need to get out into the garden and enjoy all that mother nature has to offer.
The week is there for every Australian, of every age group, to get out into the garden and enjoy. Clubs are encouraged to have some fun activities such as a High Tea, a Plant Swap Table, making flower garlands and tree plantings. What has your club planned to celebrate the event? National Gardening Week as an extension of The Garden Clubs of Australia’s primary objective, “to extend the culture of gardening into the wider community for the benefit of all citizens”. Whatever you choose to do, Dig In & Celebrate, enjoy the experience and we would love to receive some photos of your event – details below.
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Dig In & Celebrate!
National Gardening Week offers a wonderful opportunity to celebrate the simple joys of gardening and to promote an activity that is good for both mind and body!
Over the last few years, we as a nation have faced droughts, fires, floods and the uncertainty that a global pandemic can bring to our lives. Gardening, whether it be on country acres, a suburban block or a high-rise balcony, can be a refuge from your day-to-day worries, a haven to lose one’s self and a pastime to find peace with nature.
The focus for National Gardening Week 2022 is all about that journey of discovery. Discover the garden, discover the plants and discover the passion! Dig in and discover the simple joys that gardening brings!
In 2022, we also celebrate Queen Elizabeth II’s Platinum Jubilee and to mark the occasion, the Queens Green Canopy initiative or “treebilee”, was launched. The aim is to plant trees to extend the ‘green canopy’ in the UK and across the world. Given our recent devasting bushfires and the loss of so much of our own green canopy, “treebilee” presents a great opportunity to plant a tree and celebrate National Gardening Week.
National Gardening Week is proudly supported by the Garden Clubs of Australia (GCA). Established in 1950, GCA it is the nation’s premiere organisation for garden clubs and other like-minded groups and today has more than 750 affiliates representing over 50,000 members. National Gardening Week fulfils one of the organisations main aims of extending the culture of gardening into the wider community for the benefit of all citizens, with many of the affiliate garden clubs celebrating the event each year.
The driving force behind National Gardening Week is passionate gardener, immediate past president of the GCA and National Gardening Week Ambassador, George Hoad AM. “This year marks the 6th year National Gardening Week will be celebrated across the country and it’d heartening to see so many ‘new’ gardeners coming onboard each year – digging in and celebrating this most enjoyable of activities.”
National Gardening Week is open to everybody – people of all ages, organisations, businesses, local communities, local councils, schools, etc. – to participate in and celebrate gardening in any way they choose. Throw a garden party, visit a local park, join a garden club, plant a tree, visit your local nursery or just spend a day relaxing on the lawn – the list of possible activities is endless!
As in previous years, why not share your planned event with others – on social media, websites or with your local media outlet to share your enthusiasm for gardening with the hashtag #digin&celebrate. Document your event with a photograph or video and upload your celebration to your social media outlets and the National Gardening Week Facebook page with the hashtag #digin&celebrate. Let’s put the nation’s attention on gardening for this one week of the year by digging in.
For further information contact:
George Hoad AM
52 Alfred Road,Killabakh NSW 2429
Phone: 02 65505890
Email: ghoad@internode.on.net
www.gardenclubs.org.au
Ideas for your Club’s Participation in National Gardening Week
Here’s a few ideas and activities that to celebrate National Gardening Week – if you can add to the list please don’t hesitate to contact us. Email – president@gardenclubs.org.au
Herbs in the garden or planted in pots
Herbs are easy to grow and useful in the kitchen – plant up a sunny spot in the garden or gather a collection of pots and enjoy the flavours!
Recycle/upcycle quirky containers
Old paint tins, tool boxes, gum boots, shoes make great herb pots or succulent displays.
Create unusual signage in the garden or veggie patch
Use some old bricks, pavers, roofing tiles, rocks and waterproof permanent marker or paint to make unique markers for your veggie or herb patch.
Make a scarecrow
Lots of fun for a classroom activity or rainy afternoon with the kids and a decorative feature in the garden!
Put in a Birdbath
Birds love a drink and somewhere to splash about especially in our hot and dry summers. Buy a birdbath or let your imagination go wild and create your own.
Flower garlands
Creating flower garlands is a fun activity for the classroom, garden club or group of friends and how pretty you’ll look over a cup of tea afterwards.
Community Gardens
If you don’t have the space to garden at home, check out if you have a local community garden. You’ll get you own plot and a whole network of friends to advise and assist.
Games and garden quizzes
A fun way to enjoy the garden and educate at the same time, whether in the shade of a tree or indoors on inclement days.
Visit your local garden club
Look up your local club (The Garden Clubs of Australia can assist with locating) and go along to a meeting. Garden clubs are always looking for new members and offer everything from guest speakers, trading tables of interesting plants, floral displays, day outings and overnight trips – all with a cup of tea and yummy treats.
Create a sensory garden
Create a sensory garden at home, at school, in a nursing home, your local park – anywhere that will enhance the beauty of the place and excite the senses. When planning a sensory garden, it is important to combine plants and elements that appeal to all five senses – sight, sound, smell, taste and touch.
Plant a tree
Plant a tree in your garden, local park, school yard or bush regeneration project – the benefits are amazing! Not only from the pleasure of watching a tree grow and mature, admiring its natural beauty but the fact that it purifies the air by absorbing C02 and other harmful pollutants and releases life giving oxygen. Trees give shade, cool our environment, provide shelter for our wildlife, prevent soil erosion and some give us delicious fruit such as apples and oranges.
Build a bee hotel
Most native bees are solitary and make their nests in a variety of places such as soils, hollows in trees, decaying wood, hollow stems – building a bee hotel is the perfect way to encourage them into your garden, your school yard, etc.
Build a compost heap
Recycle all your vegetable and fruit scraps and create a wonderful soil conditioner and plant food.
Plant up a veggie patch
If your garden or school doesn’t already have a vegetable patch, why not create one!
Flower gardens
Whether in a pot or beds in the garden, the fragrance and colour display that flowers bring to a space is magical.