MANY HANDS MAKE LIGHT WORK
A small North Island town has a big-hearted garden club.
“Over the years, the club has provided members with inspiration, friendship, entertainment and much knowledge,” wrote Geraldine Campbell in a short history of the Tūrangi Garden Club.
Cherry De Negri, who has been chairperson since February 2019, agreed.
“I feel the club is based on encouragement,” she said.
Describing Tūrangi, in the Central North Island, Cherry said: “This is not an easy area to garden in: it challenges everybody. I just think it’s amazing what people do.
“We’ve got a great number of members with experience and talent, and you can’t help but be inspired by them.”
IN THE BEGINNING
When three women called a meeting in 1988 to gauge interest in forming a garden club, they were surprised and delighted with the response. One of the trio was Anthea Tidwell, who became the club’s first president.
A few weeks later, the first formal meeting was held at the home of Rosemary (Rosie) and Neil Small. Rosie gave a camellia pruning demonstration, which laid the foundations for many practical demonstrations in years to come.
VARIED SPEAKERS
At the club’s monthly meetings, there are raffles, sales tables, a question-andanswer session and competition tables. Profits from raffles and plant sales are used to subsidise trips and to buy bulbs. Each member is given three bulbs a year, so the scheme helps beautify Tūrangi.
Monthly speakers cover a range of topics. Club communications officer Christine Potter recalled a rose-pruning demonstration, the speaker using a rose he’d dug from his garden.
On another occasion, there was the unexpected bonus of scoring an American hydrangea expert. “He came to Taupō for the fishing and someone collared him,” Christine said.
REACHING OUT
Cherry believes a successful garden club should reach out beyond its membership. Tūrangi has two major fundraising events: a plant sale and a garden ramble, running in alternate years, with profits being given to local projects.
One recipient that gained worldwide attention was Tongariro School, the town’s 370-pupil Year 1–14 school. The money helped repurpose a junk area into a recycling facility and garden, complete with pigs.
“It’s nice, as a garden club, to be able to help with this sort of thing,” Cherry said.
This winter, some club members have been growing vegetables for the local foodbank. Silver beet, cabbage, broccoli and other plants were donated to the club, then members grew them.
Cherry pointed out that this meant people could use their gardening skills to do something for the foodbank.
ASSISTING CONSERVATION
“An area of public conservation land 10 minutes north of Tūrangi has been getting a major makeover,” Christine said.
“Two keen locals, volunteering with Project Tongariro, began trapping predators in 2007. Magnificent kōwhai trees in the reserve were being smothered by invasive Japanese honeysuckle [Lonicera japonica]. In 2014, a local contractor took pity on their attempts to clear the honeysuckle with hand slashers and joined in with some large mulching machinery – the game changed overnight.”
Since then, more than 4ha have been cleared and 18,000 trees planted. Inmates of Tongariro prison, near Tūrangi, grow locally sourced native plants that are funded from several agencies, including Te Uru Rākau (NZ Forest Service) and the Waikato Regional Council.
GARDEN RAMBLE
This year’s big event for the Tūrangi Garden Club is its biennial garden ramble to be held between 10am and 4pm over the weekend of November 13 and 14; the cost is $20 per person.
Cherry said the wide range of featured gardens would demonstrate what Tūrangi gardeners could do. One belonged to a woman in her eighties, who bought a rundown property and restored it, creating what Cherry described as “a most exquisite garden”.
This year, some gardens will have the work of local artists available for sale.
“Their products are totally brilliant,” she said.
With so much happening, it’s not surprising to learn that of Tūrangi’s population of 3650, 120 of them belong to the town’s garden club.
* For more about the Tūrangi Garden Club or November’s garden ramble, contact Cherry De Negri by email at ccdenegri@xtra.co.nz