Seawinds Nursery Volunteers Indigenous Garden - 'Seawinds Gardens', Arthurs Seat State Park, Arthurs Seat, Mornington Peninsula, VIC

Adjacent to the beautiful and tranquil Ricketts Pond, where much of the vegetation is exotic, a pathway leading eastward presents the ‘Seawinds Nursery Volunteers Indigenous Garden’.  Here we experience the beauty of native Australia, where plants have evolved to grow in rock and a thin layers of dust – others retrieve nitrogen from the atmosphere and deposit it into the soil – plants that have so cleverly learnt to thrive in a landscape where fertile soils and rain are so sporadic – where temperatures can soar to 40+°C and plummet to yield icy frosts.

The range, diversity, texture and colour displayed in this garden is truly beautiful, and, such a testament to the volunteers who devote so much of their time and expertise to be able to produce this wonderful Australian paradise.  It is a place to gather many ideas for ones own garden, as many of the plants are accompanied with signs displaying their names.

Along the pathway an information board tells of how the volunteers came together back in 1993, how they worked so hard to establish the garden only to have it destroyed by fire in the January of 1997 . . .

It is fascinating to read how hard the volunteers work to preserve many of the species that were once prolific in the region, but are now rare, and, how various plants were used by the Aborigines for food, medicines, shelter, utensils, weapons and ornaments.

Interestingly, when Matthew Flinders first climbed Arthurs Seat, he was accompanied by botanist Robert Brown, who was able to list an incredible 92 species of indigenous plants on the Mornington Peninsula !!

Helpful Hints:

– ‘Seawinds Nursery Volunteers Indigenous Garden’ is situate within ‘Seawinds Gardens’ on the Arthurs Seat Circuit Walk in ‘Arthurs Seat State Park’

      – obtain Directions here

– A list of Points of Interest in Arthurs Seat State Park can be found here

– A list of Points of Interest in Seawinds Gardens can be found here

– Most commonly accessed via Arthurs Seat Road and Purves Road

– Car Parking at ‘Seawinds Gardens’ Car Park

Discover Arthurs Seat:

– Points of Interest

– Things to Do

– Dining Out

– Shopping

– Places to Stay

– Facilities available at Arthurs Seat include:

– Picnic Tables

– Sheltered Pavilions

– Barbecues

– Public Toilets