A team of environmental advocates are starting a competition to see who is Wagga's greenest gardening guru.
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Plantation Sensation will challenge residents build a creative, environmentally friendly project in their own backyards to be judged by a panel of young people.
The idea was planted by 22-year-old Rotaract volunteer Kaitlin Jeffries, who wanted to come up with a way to get people active, out in the sunshine, and thinking about something other than COVID for a change.
"Being a small club in Wagga we don't have the capacity to fix big things like unemployment, but what we can do is bring the community together in a positive way and boost morale," Ms Jaffries said.
"I think it's going to inspire people to get a project running, get out, and do something that might make them feel a little bit happier in the current circumstances."
One of the judges will be 22-year-old Francis Elliott-Rudder, who said he wanted to see people thinking out of the box and coming up with new and inventive ways to do eco-friendly gardening.
Mr Elliott-Rudder said he would especially be looking out for people who could recycle old material into new gardening features, such as turning old tires into garden beds or pallets into pots.
"At the start of the COVID pandemic we saw a lot of people purchasing new gardening equipment, and you've got to imagine all the rubbish that would generate," Mr Elliott-Rudder said.
"Ideally we'd like to see people using what they already have and being creative with that."
Fellow judge Deagan Newell, 22, said the new generation of young people were passionate about caring for the environment, and that they would start by making a difference in their own backyards.
"I've always been a big advocate for environmental renewability, and it's great the Rotaract Club is going in that direction as well," Mr Newell said.
"This might be one of the biggest projects we've ever done, so I'm very excited to see how it goes and I'm hoping to see more environmental projects like this in the future - not just for Rotaract but for the whole of Wagga."
The competition will launch on October 1 and gardeners can submit their photos to rotaract.wagga@gmail.com until December 31.
The winning gardeners will get wine and a Bunnings voucher, and the results will be announced by January 15, 2021.
More information can be found by emailing the Wagga Rotaract Club or by contacting Wagga City Council on 6962 9100.
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