Mt Annan is a shambles

[caludia]

i know this is more of a chillspace topic, but unfortunately i found it hard to Chill about it, and considering Annan is a native botanic Garden, i hope this is ok.

Annan is falling to bits.

I have been to Mt Annan (in southwest sydney, for those unfamiliar) around 8 times in the past year.

I went to Annan today. The previous time i went was in Nov '04.

i love (or loved) annan. However due to massive funding cuts by the NSW state govt, the Gardens has had to, in the words of one curator i spoke to today, "let about a third of the natives compete".

COMPETE. not a nice word, for a botanic gardens.

this means that weeding has stopped, and watering has stopped, for about a third of the gardens.

A renovation effort is underway in the remaining gardens. So i am trying not to confuse my disappointment with impatience at the renovations. But i can already see that the new "renovated" gardens won't even rival the old gardens in all its native Glory.

Here are some choice vistas from our beautiful native gardens today. One photo shows one of the lovely native garden beds. The other shows a very healthy looking (puke) solanum aviculare tree. Sarcasm aside, these gorgeous, important plants will be dead soon.

I am a paying "Friend" of the Sydney bot gardens. So i feel entitled to have a whinge. My heart is broken! As another example, there used to be an Erythroxylum australe bush. It was never in good nick; i dont think it had ever fruited in its life, and it was more than 10 years old. Looked like a bonsai. But it was an integral part of the native gardens.

Not anymore. At first i thought it had been stolen by an ethnobotanist. Closer inspection today proved that that was NOT the case. It had been WEEDED (that is, before they stopped weeding because of funding cuts!).... without a name tag, the staff had no idea what it was. I examined the roots, and you could see the good, clean cut that had been made to lop the "weed" down. A few straggling bits of regrowth could be seed peeking up from under the mulch. Bye bye, aussie erythroxylum.

Almost all the Goodenia varia plants are dead. i am very, very glad i propagated these from cuttings (i now have more than 50 stand alone, healthy plants). Cos you're not going to have much luck from cuttings at Mt Annan, sorry to say.

This is quite a rant, isnt it? Man.

are the gardens still worth visiting? Yes. If you've never been, or havent been for ages, there is still lots to see. It's dirt cheap to get in, and free for garden Friends. But for those who relished the sheer diversity and number of natives.... this is sad news.

[Amulte]

That bites! HOW can they let our natives, more like how can the people who volnteer/employed let our natives be disginguish as weeds!?!?!?

Wait, do they take volnteers?

I caqnt speel

[ 10. March 2005, 16:02: Message edited by: Amulte ]

[Torsten]

I used to love spending time at Mt Annan. Have also propagated many plants from there, which I at times felt guilty about, but in retrospect might even save a few specimen.

While the city gardens are being anally manicured the much more important Mt Annan gardens are suffering. I'm glad the ANBG is still well funded because I guess much of what was at Mt Annan is also at ANBG.

The Erythroxylum thing is breaking my heart, because it appears to be in part my fault. About 7 years ago there were 3 plants. Then one got ripped out and there was only 2. The another one got ripped out and only one was left, but it was about 10m from the sign (where the other two were). After some mention on these and other forums about the location, and a couple of rumours about individuals going to rip them out to grow at home I decided to remove the sign. It worked. Several people complained about how they could not find the plant even though it was listed. One of them was one of the people mentioned in the rumour.

So for 4 years the single plant was doing very well after an initial slow start. And now this. While I am certain that the plant would have been ripped off well before this, I can't help feeling guilty about it being weeded though.

I have a friend at the gardens and I also know someone who has some of this species. I'll see what can be done about this....

lesson learnt - next time I'll just swap labels

[apothecary]

For any of the people who want to see:

http://www.rbgsyd.nsw.gov.au/mount_annan_b..._botanic_garden

More importantly, volunteer information:

http://www.communitybuilders.nsw.gov.au/bu...genciesvol.html

Go down to the bit about Royal Botanic Gardens.

I would love to volunteer, but 131500.info tells me it'd take quite some time to get there from where I live...so I may settle for donating chunks of my paycheck.

Most interestingly from the link on that above link:

 

quote:

---

 

Growing Friends - Propagate seeds and cuttings from plants in the three Gardens (with permission and horticultural advice from Botanic Gardens Trust staff). Growing Friends hold weekly plant sales to raise funds.

---

Do what you can guys. This is a good chance for the ethnobotanical community to show how much we love our plant spirit friends.

This isn't a request, I am commanding you.

[Amulte]

Well i got two years and a lot of love so im going to volunteer straight away, now i can spell it.

such a beautiful place... just how could .. people get their priorities mixed up. Plants need us as much as we need them damit!

Thanks for the info Apoth

[apothecary]

Yeah I'm filling out the volunteer form anyway, just because I may be able to help with something IT related, I dunno, just wanna help.

[caludia]

yeah well darcy, what happened was, i decided to dig a tunnel into the cage of the wollemi rather than break the lock. Imagine the look of surprise when the ranger saw me in the locked cage with a wollemi, posing still, to see if i could blend into the tree?

but unfortunately the tunnel i dug wasnt big enough for the tree, only for me.

but seriously

here's more pics from the Gardens.

to apoth and the other kind hearted volunteers, that is a very noble suggestion to help, and if you do find that they can use help, please PM me. However, it seems that the most pressing, most important problem is that the government will no longer allow the rangers to water large parts of the garden (i.e. the.. err... "competing" parts....)

any new young plants won't stand a good chance. Look what happens when these already-established plants don't get watered over a single summer!

[apothecary]

Fuck the government.

If anyone lives in the area, you have to write to your local politician. You pay for them to be in office. WRITE TO THEM! CALL THEM!

If it comes down to it, I have no issues with carrying 10-20L of water in a backpack from my house and stealth watering the garden.

Most of us are sitting here with a few species each that are fairly rare in the wild, mostly lophs or similar. Why the prejiduce against native plants? Just 'cos they aren't psychoactive? No prejiduce you say? Then get the hell out there and do something about this.

If you're too cheap to mail your volunteer form in, email it to me. I'll pay for your stamp.

There's no excuse...plants have given us all so much, time to give something back.