U3A Ballarat Gardening Interest Group

Event report by Coral The last function for the U3A Ballarat Garden Interest Group was held at the Buninyong Botanical Gardens on Tuesday the 7th December. Despite the cool conditions the group enjoyed a shared table of nibbles and lunch together. Lots of laughter and fun was enjoyed while we conducted a 'Black Kris Kringle' with lots of gifts swapping hands, all in good humour and lasting fun. We finished our afternoon with some funny Christmas Trivia with everyone competing with themed responses from songs, movies and history. It was a pleasure to share the gardens with the children from the Buniyong State School running around the velvety green grass, shaded by the beautiful trees, amongst small lakes and water lilies. They too enjoyed lunch amongst the trees.

Event Report by Terry O'Brien Tuesday November 2, Melbourne Cup Day, was the day for us to explore the Geelong Botanical gardens. Not for us the thrill of flashes of bobbing silk and punting. Dick Patterson had arranged this excursion earlier  but was  cancelled.     N ow with the recent easing of restrictions Dick was able to organise a second chance  for this visit. A group close to 20 gathered at Buninyong at 8.15   and once  car-pooling  organised off we went to Geelong.  We experienced very foggy views of eastern beach as we arrived at the eastern  park  arboretum where the gardens are located. The fog soon lifted  however,  and  we had perfect sunny conditions for the excursion. Morning tea at the Gardens tea house was the start of our immersion into these magnificent gardens. During morning  tea,   we  discovered our leader for the day had to detour from the garden excursion and for the rest...

  Workshop Report by Pauline Sleigh On Tuesday 15 June, Andrew hosted a session on grafting at his lovely garden in Canadian. Steve Burns held an extremely educational session and I would strongly encourage any who missed out to take the opportunity to attend if this was ever to be held again; I know I will! (Note: the workshop was filmed and a link to the video is after the photos!) The session started with Steve outlining a bit about his history and where his interest in grafting came from and his interest in productive gardening, permaculture and unusual edible species. He admitted that he had become a bit over enthusiastic in his grafting in previous years resulting in a grafted tree in pot collection that had become somewhat cumbersome. He suggested that apples were a great place to start for new grafters due to being readily available and reliably successful. Steve showed us some grafted examples and discussed the issue of apial dominance which in simple terms means the highe...

  Brisbane Courier (Qld. : 1864 - 1933), Saturday 21 September 1872, page 6 BARON VON MUELLER AND THE MELBOURNE BOTANIC GARDENS. It has been with great regret that we have observed from the Melbourne papers that differences, which appear to strengthen with time, have arisen between the learned head of the Botanical Department of Victoria and a section of the inhabitants of Melbourne At a distance from the locus in quo it is impossible to judge of the many small details which are im ported into an affair of this kind , but perhaps for that reason we can approach the subject with a more unbiased mind than were we cog nisant of all the smaller facts. The matter, as we gather from its leading features, stands thus. Those who aro dissatis-fied with the Baron's administration complain that the gardens oro not sufficiently ornamental, that they are deficient in flowers and general aitistic effect, and that the inhabitants of the city have not in the gardens that attractive place of public...