Collingwood grower makes NZ Gardener finals
NZ Gardener of the Year regional finalist, Robyn Jones of Collingwood, holding her mother’s painting of Robyn aged 11 - gardening of course. Photo: Gerard Hindmarsh.
Being told by telephone late in September that she was the Nelson regional finalist for NZ Gardener of the Year came as a total surprise to Robyn Jones of Collingwood. She didn’t even know she’d been nominated for the annual NZ Gardener magazine competition by her Gibbs Road neighbour Penny Griffith, who in turn had been inspired after Takaka organic gardener Sol Morgan scooped the title two years ago.
Now its Robyn’s turn to put down her well-worn spade and collect some richly-deserved accolades as one of our horticultural heroes. Robyn was recognised in particular for her work with Aorere Streamcare, not only in the bursting native nursery behind Collingwood School, but for the planting of stream margins all around the Aorere Valley, and her five years of work with a dedicated team that has seen a vast improvement in the quality of water run-off through local dairy farms.
Then there’s her selfless work with Coast Care, the Mangarakau Swamp restoration project, and helping Keep Golden Bay Beautiful, many hours of which are completely voluntary. In the October issue of NZ Gardener, she’s also acknowledged for taking to native plants in a manner that she believes will change the New Zealand landscape.
The projects Robyn is working on may be never-ending, but she loves what she does, explaining, “it’s as much my pleasure as it is my work.”
Born in Auckland, Robyn lived in the Bay of Plenty before shifting to Golden Bay around 35 years ago, initially at Rainbow Valley. Later, she moved onto the hillside above Clifton and set up Beautiful Begonias, a mail order and retail plant business that she ran for 20 years and which earned her the nickname of “the begonia lady”. She moved to her quarter acre section of regenerating manuka scrub along Gibbs Road around six years ago, hand-cutting out every bit of gorse and planting a few more natives before unleashing herself on the wider landscape as a tireless champion of native plants. “They’re unique and it’s important to preserve them,” she avows.
Needless to add, Robyn grew up with gardening in the blood. Her mother, Mary Jessup, was a keen gardener who encouraged her daughter to tend her own plot in the vege garden from the age of five. “Mum loved painting pictures, too. I’ve still got the one she did of me aged 11, working in the garden, bending over with a spade. My stream-planting colleagues say I still work exactly in this posture. Not much has really changed, except maybe my ambition is to landscape the whole countryside now. But really, I’m only one of many. There are so many people out there now, just toiling away quietly planting out, making this a more beautiful country. It fills me with great joy.”
NZ’s top Gardener of Year will be chosen from the 15 regional finalists by public vote, which can be recorded on the official voting form in the October issue of NZ Gardener and then posted in, or by voting online at www.nzgardener.co.nz. Voting closes October 31 and the winner, who will be announced in the December issue, will receive $5000 of gift cards from Mitre 10 and a luxury trip for two to the 2011 Ellerslie Flower Show.
Gerard Hindmarsh
