Newsletter March 2025
CHAIRPERSON’S REPORT
SUMMER GARDEN PARTY
We held our Summer Garden Party on 1 March, and it was yet another wonderful day. Purists will point out that 1 March is, in fact, the first day of Autumn, but we’re a “glass half full” type of organisation and like to extend the good things in life. We had a great summer, so why not extend it by a day?
Hannah Moloney from ABC’s Gardening Australia was there and officially opened our new composting stage. She was very entertaining and gave a composting masterclass after the opening ceremony. This is a wonderful new addition to our infrastructure. Funds were provided by the Burnie City Council (and thanks again to the Mayor and Councillors), and the build was imagined, designed, and completed by Baz and Tess Morrell. What a team these two are– thanks guys, you do an amazing job and are such an asset to the garden.
A very welcome visitor for our Summer Garden Party last weekend was Hannah Moloney. Hannah is the Tasmanian host for the ABC’s Gardening Australia program on Channel 2. She is a permaculture educator, community worker, designer and best-selling author, and is pictured above (on the right) with our equally notable and appreciated Café and Event Manager Lynne Kershaw.
James McGregor was also there, talking about our resident platypus. In conjunction with James, we have recently been awarded a grant to “monitor platypus using citizen science in potential climate refugia.” This is a huge project and will assist in our understanding of our favourite resident.
We had music, courtesy of “Sync or Swing” and “Black Current Tango.” Deviant Gin and Communion Brewing were there, and our catering teams supplied delicious jacket spuds and sausages. Forbidden sweets and “I serve ice-cream” were on site too. We had roaming fairies, plant finding activities and a best hat competition. Thanks must go to our volunteers, without whom none of this would have been possible.
Thank you, you are amazing.
AUSTRALIA TOURISM AWARDS
As Gold Award winners of the Tasmanian Tourism Awards late last year we are automatically finalists in the Australian Tourism awards. The winner will be announced on Friday 21st March.
While it would be nice to win at the National level, there is some pretty fierce competition, and we are happy enough that we are recognised as National Finalists. This is a tribute to the founders, volunteers and staff who have made this garden what it is.
FORTHCOMING EVENTS
12 April – Autumn Spectacular
From 4 June and every Wednesday in Winter – our famous and popular “Winter Warmers” will be back on the agenda!! Enjoy some warming comfort food and good company.
Ant Dry
Chairperson & Acting General Manager
Hello from the Volunteers Tourism Team
Meredith, Frances and David still smiling in the buggy after a busy day with passengers from the Silver Muse.
As you can see from the accompanying photo, our volunteers are coming to the end of another cruise ship season. Our small team have been greeting the visitors as they come off their buses, handing out maps and giving directions for the garden facilities. Visitors have the option of guided walks, self-guided walks, buggy rides or just sitting on the balcony with a delicious Devonshire tea and enjoying the marvelous view.
The aforementioned options do depend on what the specific tour companies have booked for. Some are inclusive, some options require payment on the day and some just provide garden entry and transport to and from the Burnie CBD. Our team have had an enjoyable summer chatting to visitors from all over the world, sharing holiday stories, memories of favourite gardens visited, gardening tips and in general being great ambassadors for EVRG, Burnie and Tasmania. After all, it is the people as well as the garden that make us an award-winning tourist location.
If this is something you think you would like to try, we would love to hear from you. It is fun, interesting and you definitely get back as much as you put in. Once cruise ship season finishes, we still have coach groups from Tassie and interstate during the year, plus we have requests for buggy tours all year around. Training for doing buggy driving, tour guiding and especially what to say is provided and you get to work with an experienced volunteer until you are comfortable on your own. You can do as much or as little as you like, although practice does make perfect, so the more you do, the better and more experienced you will become. We have a list of upcoming tours and contact team members to ask who is free on any given day. Buggy tour drivers get a group text as bookings are often requested within a 24- hour period.
So, if you are interested, or know someone who you think would be, please make contact with me at volunteers@emuvalleyrhodogarden.org.au Meredith
Around the Garden
Autumn is here and hopefully rain will come with it. We have just had to buy drinking water to supply our main building for the first time this summer, so I feel like we did a pretty good job in conserving what we could, when we could.
A massive thank you to everyone who helped in the lead up and on the day of our Garden Party last weekend. Thank you to all who visited and made the day a success. There was plenty of food, colour, entertainment, sales and activities with smiles on faces throughout the garden. Next date to save is April 12 for our Autumn Spectacular day.
Keeping this addition short but please enjoy some happy snaps below from our garden party and some special garden friends that I have captured in the last month.
Neet
Rhododendron rubropilosum
Rhododendron rubropilosum is an evergreen azalea found growing on Mt. Morrison Taiwan on grass covered slopes at elevations of 2400-3400m, where it grows into an upright shrub from 1-3m high (around 2m in our garden).
The young shoots are covered with grey or reddish-brown hairs. Leaves are oblong-lanceolate or elliptic-lanceolate, the upper surface dark green, under surface pale green, both surfaces have scattered hairs similar hairs to the shoots. Flowers are funnel shaped, pale pink sometimes spotted rose and usually appear in clusters of 3-4 in September early October.
Rhododendron rubropilosum is closely related to R. subsessile, the main difference is the flowers are violet-purple or rose-pink on R. subsessile and the stamens are longer and is native to the Philippine Islands.
This species was first collected by G. Nakahara in 1906 and was introduced by Wilson in 1918 and by J.L. Creech in 1968. At the Emu Valley Rhododendron Garden it is growing quite well and can be seen on either side of the Noel Sullivan walk in our Taiwan section.
Maurie
