By CASEY NEILL
A SPRINGVALE Garden Club stalwart has received the highest horticulture honour in Australia.
Shirley Boden, 82, has been with the club since it started 33 years ago.
“I joined the very first night that it was being formed and I’ve been going ever since,” she said.
“I’m the only one in the garden club that has been there all that time.
“I’ve done just about everything there – I’ve been the secretary, the treasurer, the president …
“Now I’m on the trading desk. People bring in plants, we sell them on the trading table. They get 80 per cent of what we charge, and the club gets 20 per cent.”
The club had a surprise for her at its Christmas lunch on 7 December – a Gold John Pascoe Fawkner Medal for distinguished service to horticulture.
The Royal Horticultural Society of Victoria president and secretary were on-hand at Sandown Park Hotel to make the presentation.
“It was a huge surprise,” Ms Boden said.
“I never expected anything like that.
“You do these things not for what you’re going to get back, but because you enjoy it.
“I just felt I was just doing what everybody does in these clubs.
“I didn’t know what to say. I just stood there like a fool.”
Ms Boden has always been interested in gardening.
“I did a course in landscaping and gardening before I joined the garden club,” she said.
And her sons and daughter have followed her passion, gaining qualifications in landscaping and horticulture.
“It’s such a relaxing thing, gardening,” she said.
“If you’ve got any problems it takes your mind off them.”
Ms Boden moved to a more manageable home in Mornington about 18 months ago to be closer to her son, after 55 years in Springvale.
“I must admit I feel very comfortable when I go back to Springvale,” she said.
And she regularly makes the journey to her former home.
“I drive up on garden club night, which is the third Wednesday in the month,” she said.
She helps to set up for the events, which feature speakers from nurseries and other experts.
The club also holds regular bus trips, and welcomes new members.
Call secretary Cheryl Johnson on 9551 3197 for more information.
