Archived news

Growing Friends Plant Sale - November 2016

Fortunately, the rain and thunderstorm did not arrive on Saturday morning as predicted. A queue of people, many of them happy returning customers, had arrived by 8:30.

Thanks to the Growing Friends who helped with the sale, both with the setting up on Friday afternoon and on Saturday morning and also in the weeks leading up to the sale. Many of the volunteers at the sale were Growing Friends who have joined us recently – thank you, and once again, welcome to the Growing Friends.

The next plant sale will be on 25th March 2017.

Sunday, 13 November 2016

Panel Discussion: Crop Wild Relatives and Genebanks

Members of the Friends are invited to a free panel discussion at CSIRO Discovery Centre, Black Mountain, at 3-5 pm on 2 November 2016. RSVP is essential. Click on the blue heading above for more details.

Wednesday, 26 October 2016

Helen Elliot, Kath Holtzapffel and Lesley Jackman, 2016 AGM. Photo: David Cox

Friends' Annual General Meeting, 19 October 2016

The 28th AGM was held on Wednesday 19 October.

Click on the heading above for full details.

Friday, 21 October 2016

Breakfast with the Birds 2016. Photo: Pam Rooney

Breakfast with the Birds 2016 season

We had a marvellous time with this year’s season of Breakfast with the Birds despite the threatening weather. Our Tawny frogmouth on the nest disappeared when a huge limb fell off the tree but otherwise the birds were cooperative, sharing nesting activities and feeding their young for our enjoyment. The magpies had added plant name tags to their already blue tape decorated nests in the apartment tree outside the Crosby Morrison building. There were lots of honeyeaters – breakfasting on the nectar in the grevilleas along the main path and the spotted pardalote was once more in the tunnel, allowing us to share his jewel-like colours up close. A discordant note was struck by a Goshawk making life hard for the Wood ducks and their ducklings on the café lawn although it was interesting to see the way the parents protected the young against predation.

Thursday, 20 October 2016

Weekend Botanic Art Group

A third botanic art group has recently been started, to cater for the many Friends who are not able to join the existing two groups, which meet during the week. The newest group meets on the 3^rd Saturday of every month from 9:15 am to 2:00 pm. Click on the heading above for more information. If you are in interested in joining the new group, please contact Helen Hinton botanicart@friendsanbg.org.au

Thursday, 06 October 2016

Strategic Plan 2016-20: your feedback wanted

Council has been developing a new Strategic Plan 2016-20 during the year (download in PDF format, 335 KB or Microsoft Word .docx format, 37 KB). Careful attention has been given to Friends’ organisational material, including the Constitution and the Memorandum between the ANBG and the Department. Consideration has also been given to the current work and future directions of the Friends.

We would be pleased now to receive comments from the Friends’ membership. Please send by email to strategicplan@friendsanbg.org.au by 22 August 2016.

Thursday, 14 July 2016

Latest issue of Eucalypt published

The May 2016 edition of Eucalypt, the journal of the Australian Association of Friends of Botanic Gardens, is now available. Issue 46 includes a report on the 2016 AAFBG biennial Conference held at Geelong Botanic Gardens, 29 April to 3 May; other news from botanic gardens in Australia, New Zealand - and Fiji; and the AAFBG calendar of events 2016-17.

Monday, 16 May 2016

Volunteers needed for IT support

The Friends have need of one or two volunteers to help with IT support. This is for technical support and not data entry. This would not be a greatly time-consuming task but there are several computers, and the website, that can need some attention from time to time. This is true for the Friends office computer and also for the new computers being installed in the Botanical Resource Centre to provide access to plant keys etc.

Thursday, 28 April 2016

Jo Walker collecting Coprosma hirtella, Square Rock Track. Photo: Tom North

Seedy Volunteers activities during the 2015-16 summer season

Making new collections from the ACT to the National Seed Bank (NSB) is becoming more difficult as we narrow our target species to complete the collection of the total ACT flora. By 2020 we are aiming to have representative collections of all 1070 vascular plant taxa in the NSB. Click on the heading to read on.

Thursday, 21 April 2016

Halina Steele opens the exhibition (Photo: Alan Munns)

9th Botanic Arts Groups Exhibition

The combined Friends' Botanic Art Groups present a collection of botanic art featuring Australian native plants in the Visitor Centre Gallery. The exhibition is open to the public from Saturday 19 March until Sunday 17 April. The majority of paintings are for sale with a proportion of proceeds going to support Friends activities. All of the art works exhibited portray native Australian plants many of which can be found in the Australian National Botanic Gardens.

Wednesday, 23 March 2016