Meet our volunteers

I am so thankful to the 800 plus volunteers that support the people, culture, and environment of the Botanic Gardens.

We are extremely lucky to have so many dedicated volunteers that love and respect our green spaces as much as we do. Volunteering is one of the life bloods of our organisation and has been a part of the way we work for over 40 years.

Thank you so much for all that you do throughout the year. 

Denise Ora, Chief Executive of the Botanic Gardens Greater Sydney

How did volunteers support the Botanic Gardens this year?

The past year has been challenging for so many reasons, but it also gave people the chance to reflect and embrace new technology to connect with family and friends, and to learn new activities through virtual platforms. Many of our volunteers continued to assist remotely with resource development or research for their programs.

The Royal Botanic Garden Sydney Volunteer Guides continued to conduct their monthly meetings along with guest speakers via Zoom and Steve Cartland, Head Volunteer Guides, produced a monthly Botanic Bugle with wonderful botanical stories and contributions from other volunteers, links to talks and virtual learning opportunities.

The volunteers delivered 754 guided walks, generated almost $10,000 to support the important work that the Botanic Gardens do, staffed events and exhibitions across 32 programs and volunteered 20,478 hours resulting in $800,000 in-kind value of volunteer hours. They are vital to our public spaces.

The Garden’s first volunteer group consisted of eight guides taking the public for walks around our historic site.

Today the volunteers donate their time and skills to assist the programs and work covering; horticulture, science, visitor engagement and information services, herbarium specimen-mounting, bush regeneration, wildlife monitoring and asset restoration.

The Garden’s charitable organisation, Foundation and Friends of the Botanic Gardens volunteers also assist in a variety of programs including the Growing Friends, plant sales, Botanica and Artisans in the Gardens exhibitions and events such as the New Years Eve Picnic. All of these efforts help by raising money to support the projects that otherwise would not be possible.

Learn more

There are over 800 volunteers making a difference across the Blue Mountains Botanic Garden Mount Tomah, Australian Botanic Garden Mount Annan, Royal Botanic Garden Sydney and with the Foundation and Friends of the Botanic Gardens.