The Friends' Annual General Meeting will be held as follows: DATE: TUESDAY 11 MAY 2021 TIME: 5.30PM VENUE: MARGARET WHITLAM PAVILION Refreshments will be served after the meeting. We also have a Guest Speaker for this event: Max Bourke AM and Life Member of the Friends who will speak about "Trees of North Africa and Spain- Wandering in the Modern Almohad Caliphate". Further details appear below. Please join us!

Join us for dinner and support the Friends fund-raising efforts by coming along to a relaxing evening with Friends of like mind! Tickets available for purchase.

The beautiful wildflowers are still blooming at STEP. We note that the rain at Forest 20 is measured on a weekly basis. For the week 18-25 March, 107 mm was recorded which fell over 3 days!

At the end of 2020, Friends agreed to sponsor the Arboretum's first Forest Pod Gazebo and entered into a Memorandum of Understanding to pay for the structure in four bi-annual installments. The MoU was duly signed at our End-of-Year Friends & NAC party. The Gazebos are a multi-purpose shelter around forest and garden locations throughout the Arboretum environment. The structures are environmentally and aesthetically designed to fit within the landscape. They will provide sun and rain protection, and offer on-site interpretation for visitors, with seating suitable for educational, corporate and tourist groups.

A new year - a new opportunity! Now is the time for you to participate in FrogWatch 2021. There is an opportunity for 3-4 people to join the FrogWatch Group. Training will be offered on site at the times noted below. This is a wonderful opportunity to see the Arboretum in a totally different ‘light’, and to experience some of the hidden diversity on the site!

Hello all creative crafters This is the first newsletter about Warm Trees 21. There will be a total of five newsletters providing more information about the various parts of the plan as the detail of the plan develops. Our plans will always need to include the current COVID safe instructions at the time. Seems so long since we involved together in this project that is enthusiastically supported by the National Arboretum Canberra and you all and the many visitors to the Arboretum. I hope you and yours are well and the complexity of the times has not been too difficult. Given the vaccines are starting to roll out it seems that it is safe to say we will achieve a Warm Trees installation this year. So on this basis, let’s get knitting, crocheting and/or crafting – whatever you choose. I know that after last year it will be very special indeed to be adding colour to the Arboretum for those cooler times. Can't wait!

This very popular course that will help you to know so much more about our Arboretum trees is open for enrolments to anyone who is a member of U3A. The course is in four parts, each of 6-7 weekly sessions and 2 walks. Each part covers about a quarter of the trees in our forests and is full of interesting stories. You don’t have to do all the parts in a year and you can do them in any order that suits. Part 1 commenced this week (15 Feb) and only a few spots are available. The others all each have a good number already signed up so it is highly likely they will be going ahead.

Yvonne Aki-Sawyerr, mayor of Freetown, Sierra Leone, is on a mission to plant a million trees over the next two years, increasing vegetation in her city by fifty percent while shoring up eroding riverbanks and increasing biodiversity.

Congratulations to Matthew Hartley, winner of the 2020 Jake Keller Award. The presentation was made at the joint Friends & National Arboretum Canberra end-of-year event on 16 December. A great night!

Thanks to our enthusiasts at Friends of ACT Trees, below is the list of Westbourne Woods Arboretum monthly walks for your calendars. They are free guided 2-hour walks through the grounds of the Royal Canberra Golf Club. 2nd Sunday of every month: meet at 9.30 am at the entrance to Royal Canberra Golf Club, Bentham Street Yarralumla. No dogs allowed. The dress code of the Golf Club which can be found at www.royalcanberra.com.au applies if you wish to accept the invitation of the Club to take refreshments at the Spike Bar after the walk. PLEASE WEAR SENSIBLE SHOES/CLOTHES AND BRING A HAT AND WATER. WHEN WITHIN THE GOLF COURSE PLEASE RESPECT GOLFERS' NEEDS TO BE ABLE TO PLAY SHOTS WITHOUT DISTURBANCE.