The greener you are in the garden, the more chance you have of winning, so don't forget to tell us how your garden is helping the environment to give yourself that winning edge.

Categories

1. Best back garden: Enter your beautiful back yard in this category. Remember that sustainable gardening practices = more points!
2. Best balcony garden: If you have cultivated a garden on an apartment balcony then enter this category.
3. Best courtyard garden: If you have a small back yard with no lawn, a lot of paved surfaces, pots or limited soil depth*, this category is for you. Limited soil depth means that planting beds are no deeper than 75cm, however you can still enter this category if your soil is deeper, provided your courtyard is small i.e. 20 square metres and does not include a lawn. If you are unsure whether you fit into the courtyard category call 9386 7925 to discuss.
4. Best street frontage: This category covers front gardens and/or footpath gardens that make your frontage look great. Please note that your footpath garden must have been officially approved by Council before entering this award. To find out more about footpath garden approvals call 9386 7999.
5. Best community-maintained garden: This category is for local people who have adopted an open space, including a school, common land in an apartment complex, hospital, nursing home, pocket park and so on.
6. The Encouragement Award: This is a special acknowledgement which is awarded at the judges’ discretion to a gardener who overcomes a lack of money, knowledge, time or fitness to increase civic pride and improve the local community through gardening. This category does not apply to professionally maintained gardens and is decided at the judges’ discretion.

Judges have discretion at time of judging to re-categorise your nomination

Criteria
These awards recognise beautiful gardens that are kind to the environment. Judging criteria will be include, but not limited to:

• Whether you recycle/harvest water, including having a rainwater tank
  
• Overall appearance and attractiveness of your garden
  
• Use of drought-tolerant plants
  
• How well you maintain your garden
  
• Use of a compost bin or worm farm
  
• Quality of landscaping
  
• Whether you grow vegetables, fruit and herbs
  
• Use of native plants, which provide food and habitat for native animals
  
• The level of biodiversity in your garden
  
• Inclusion of a nesting box, or placement of rocks and leaf to create a home for lizards and insects
  
• Use of organic/non chemical gardening practices
  
• How your garden enhances community pride
  

Prizes

First prize in each category is a $200 voucher courtesy of Honeysuckle Garden Centre Bondi Junction and a signed copy of Myles Baldwin's beautiful book Period Gardens. Runners up will receive $100 vouchers.

The prize ceremony will be part of the gorgeous Bronte House Garden Festival on 22 November. The festival runs across two days with stalls, a plant sale and free garden advice.

Judging

Entries close on Tuesday 7 October.

You must submit two or more colour photos of your garden for preliminary judging. If your garden passes the preliminary round, we will contact you to arrange access to your garden on one of the judging dates.

Judging will occur on Thursday 23, Friday 24 and Saturday 25 October. You must allow the judging panel access to your property on one of these days.  Fill in the online nomination form to apply.

Call Eleanor Raftery on 9386 7925 for more information, or email EleanorR@waverley.nsw.gov.au

Workshops

Our Environmental Services team runs a number of free workshops to help lighten your carbon footprint. Click here for details

Civic Pride

The Civic Pride Program is all about local people celebrating their environment, heritage and community.