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Meet our volunteers

We believe that our volunteers are a vital part of the pure energy and enthusiasm that maintains the vibrant environment for the public to enjoy across the Royal Botanic Gardens and Domain Trust. Most importantly volunteering reconnects the community with nature, keeps you socially active and mentally healthy.

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 volunteers delivered 143 guided walks, generated over $13,000 to support the important work that the Botanic Gardens do, staffed events and exhibitions across 30 programs and volunteered 32,437 hours resulting in $1.3 million 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 Year's Eve Picnic. All of these efforts help by raising money to support the projects that otherwise would not be possible.

Who are our volunteers? Now a large network, our volunteers who support us range from 18 to over 80 years of age, they bring an enormous range of professional skills plus personal passion to their volunteer positions.

What do they do? Volunteers contribute to a range of activities in most areas of the organisation in 32 different programs.