2026 for the Friends!

Happy New Year Friends!

A big welcome to 2026 to all our Friends, families and supporters. We hope you enjoyed your festive celebrations and relaxing holidays. And we hope your 2026 includes all things Friends of Kyneton Botanic Gardens!

The Committee has held its first meeting of the year and is committed to continuing the momentum of 2025 and looks forward to what’s ahead with enthusiasm and energy. Our key objectives remain as follows:

to help maintain and improve the Kyneton Botanic Gardens through working bees and in-kind contributions of knowledge and expertise
to promote KBG to the wider community and increase its usage
to promote the work of the Friends of Kyneton Botanic Gardens in order to attract financial support, and fundraise, to enable us to contribute to specific Gardens projects, as per the Master Plan.

Our finances are in excellent shape which enables us to contribute to some major projects in the Gardens this year. The November Plant Sale, and the December Pop-up Sale, netted us just over $4,200 - a great effort! Significantly, we were once again the beneficiaries of a very generous donation from the Bolobek Garden Fair 2025 held in October. We sincerely thank Brigid Robertson, her family and the Bolobek team for their continued support and look forward to helping with this year’s Fair.

The first working bee for the year was held in late January and a great deal of cutting back, tidying and general maintenance was done by our enthusiastic volunteers. A Depot working bee earlier this month also achieved a great deal as we had not been back there since the end of our plant sale in early December! We were pleasantly surprised by the condition of the remaining plants thanks to the watering system and the efforts of John and his staff.

Whilst there is already a lot happening in the Gardens it is about to ramp up once the heat of summer subsides. Major projects are about to commence!

Front entrance plans

We are very excited about the imminent arrival of two stunning specimens, one for each side of our front entrance gates. Our Head Gardener, John, and his team have selected two established Cussonia paniculata, or Mountain Cabbage Trees, from Roraima Nursery in Lara. Each sits in its own large steel planter and will be brought up on the back of a truck and dropped into place by crane. They will be impossible to remove once positioned and will look spectacular!

Planned Events for 2026

Autumn Community Picnic

Sunday, April 19th, 11.00am - 3.00pm

A free community BYO picnic in the Botanic Gardens in conjunction with the Macedon Ranges Autumn Festival. Live music, children’s activities, coffee cart, Gardeners Cottage `open house’ and our special guest, Dr Greg Moore. Greg will host our panel of experts for a `Past, Present and Future’ Q&A session at 11.30am plus take a guided garden tour at 2.00pm.

Add this date to your calendar and be sure to bring along your families, your neighbours and any `out-of-towners’ to whom you want to show off what Kyneton has to offer!

Diary dates

May 18 - 26 Botanic Gardens Week

October 3 - 4 Bolobek Garden Fair

Working Bees

This year the regular monthly working bees in the Gardens will be held on Fridays with the addition of a second day each month to accommodate availability and also to get more work done in the Gardens. Our working bees are an integral part of the improvement and maintenance of our gardens and whilst occasionally our tasks are mundane, eg. weeding, they are important, necessary and greatly appreciated by our Head Gardener, John and his team. Importantly, the small team of regular volunteers enjoy being in the gardens working together, exchanging knowledge and having a lot of fun, especially over a convivial morning tea break.

The Woodend Depot working bees will also be held on Fridays each month and will once again focus on sourcing and preparing plant stock for sale. The small group of regular volunteers enjoy their work and a happy, interesting and informative chat over morning tea.

Our FKBG Gardens Co-ordinator, Margot McDonald, manages our working bees with great skill, expertise and humour and we are indeed fortunate to benefit from her commitment and extensive knowledge. Margot works closely with John, the Head Gardener, to determine what jobs are to be done each working bee and puts in many additional hours to ensure each session runs smoothly. We also benefit greatly from having John and his team work alongside us too. Thanks Margot and John for your endless enthusiasm for our Gardens!

Your Friendship is important!

Your FKBG Committee invite you to actively contribute to the ongoing maintenance, improvement and guardianship of our Botanic Gardens.

If you have an interest in, and expertise, in social media and websites, collating historical records, composing display posters and graphic design, among a plethora of other tasks, please get in contact with our Secretary with your expression of interest: friendsKBG@outlook.com

We look forward to your continued support of FKBG in 2026. Together we are making a significant difference!

Theft in the Gardens

Sadly, late last year we noticed the theft of several freshly planted specimens from various parts of the Botanic Gardens. This is extremely disheartening for John and his team and for our volunteers who work so tirelessly to improve and maintain the Gardens. We notified Police at the time and they agreed to regularly check the area.

After a big working bee effort in November to plant out dozens of new plants, and following a spate of recent thefts, temporary fencing was erected around the large `Simon Rickard’ bed. Thankfully, this measure seems to have worked….. for now.

Please keep your eye out when visiting the Gardens and report any suspicious behaviour, noting vehicle registrations if possible! If you see something, say something!

friendsKBG@outlook.com