Volunteer with us
As a volunteer, you will gain new information, fresh ideas, renewed spirits, and the friendship and appreciation of the Juniper Level Botanic Garden family – with your efforts our days are much richer indeed!
Volunteer with us
As a volunteer, you will gain new information, fresh ideas, renewed spirits, and the friendship and appreciation of the Juniper Level Botanic Garden family – with your efforts our days are much richer indeed!
Join our community
We enjoy sharing our love and appreciation of these plants with our volunteers; learning the plants’ cultural requirements, and the ability to follow their growth through complete yearly cycles is an excellent educational experience. Our volunteer program at Juniper Level Botanic Garden introduces our volunteers to many plant genera which are unknown to the general gardening public. Seeing the beauty of nature through our volunteers’ eyes renews and refreshes our own appreciation – and the friendship and hard work of our volunteer staff helps keep the quality of the Garden at its best.
Volunteers at JLBG are committed to quality gardening and love the outdoors, and anything green (whether it flowers or not!). As a volunteer, you will gain new information, fresh ideas, renewed spirits, and the friendship and appreciation of the Juniper Level Botanic Garden family – with your efforts our days are much richer indeed!
If you are interested in digging into JLBG, please fill out the Volunteer Form.
Benefits of being involved
Ways to get involved
Opportunities Abound!
We all have strengths, skills, and interests. Let us know your availability and how you would like to be involved. It could be almost anything. We have so many things going on that we can find something inside and out for you to plug into.
Wednesday and Thursday Garden Volunteers
Every week a group of volunteers comes out to help with work going on in the Garden from 9 to 11:30 a.m. (Hours may change based on weather forecasts). Our volunteers weed, prune, dig plants, install plants, mulch, and help with seasonal cutbacks. Each week is different. Volunteers can select either day or both. If weather precludes garden activities on your scheduled day, you will be notified the evening prior. Occasionally, indoor activities may be available, so we’ll let you know. Opportunities are available both in the public garden sections as well as our research/trial/field production areas (Area 51).
Saturday Once a Month Garden Volunteers
One Saturday each month a group of volunteers comes out to help with work going on in the Garden from 9 to 11:30 a.m. (Hours may change based on weather forecasts). Our volunteers weed, prune, dig plants, install plants, mulch, and help with seasonal cutbacks. If weather precludes garden activities on your scheduled day, you will be notified the evening prior.
Special Hours Garden Volunteers
If the above volunteer times don’t work for you, you can contact our garden manager, Logan Clark directly about when you would like to join the Garden crew on projects. We will do our best to accommodate your schedule within staff constraints. Opportunities are available both in the public garden sections as well as our research/trial/field production areas (Area 51).
Seed Collector/Cleaning Assistant
We collect seed from more than 3,000 different plants annually. All plants need to be visually inspected, recorded, seeds collected, cleaned, and stored! Whoa! Whether you want to be in the field going plant-to-plant or would rather be sifting through and cleaning the various seeds, this is the opportunity for you. Volunteer hours needed vary from month to month. Contact Emily at seeds@plantdelights.com
Plant Breeder or Specialty Collection Curatorial Assistant
We have an array of plant breeding projects that we simply can’t tackle due to staff constraints. We are always looking for volunteers who want to handle a specific breeding project or help with curating one of our specialty collections. These are what we call “deep dive” projects, usually best accomplished by an OCD individual. Often a breeding project requires a regular, almost daily time commitment during the flowering season. If you have such an interest, please contact our Garden Curator Doug Ruhren.
Labeling Assistant
The hallmark of any good botanical garden is to have every plant labeled in the Garden and with thousands of plants spread out across 28-acres, that means there are lots of tags to account for! This person, or a small group of people, would ideally be able to come out once a week and walk a portion of the Garden, scanning for tags. Duties include writing down the names of broken tags; placing green landscape flags in front of plants with broken or missing tags; fixing tags so they are easy to see from paths; assembling printed tags; and helping the Garden Curator put out tags.
Open House Ambassador
We always need smiling faces to greet visitors during Juniper Level Botanic Garden Open House days. This is a flexible commitment opportunity where you can work a few hours or the whole weekend; whatever works for you. It is a lot of fun to hang out with other volunteers, catch the Gardening Unplugged talks, and meet all the keen folks who visit the Garden during these special times.
Currently a Sign-up-Genius sheet will be set up for each open house and sent to those volunteers who are already in the system and have indicated an interest in volunteering at open houses. If you’d like to be added to our list, fill out the form below.
Tour guides
The number of groups visiting Juniper Level Botanic Garden and wanting a guided tour is increasing and is likely to continue to increase. Volunteers willing and able to lead tours would be greatly helpful. The greatest need would be for school groups and retirement communities. Tour guides would work on an as-needed basis. Such tours are arranged far in advance.
Feathered Friends
For years, our volunteers have made bird counts at JLBG. We are looking to expand that program to the construction of bluebird nesting boxes, brown nuthatch nesting boxes and purple martin houses. We are looking for an individual or several individuals willing to partner with construction, installation, monitoring, and maintenance.
A note on physical work in the garden
Our volunteers in the Garden work at all gardening tasks, such as: planting, digging and dividing plants, bed maintenance, adding soil, edging, mulching beds, weeding, pruning, cutting back old growth, and deadheading flowering plants, just to name a few.
We work in most weather, except when extreme cold or heat, or steady rain keep us indoors. Potential volunteers must judge their own tolerance for weather, especially heat, and the amount of exertion you are capable of. You should be able to lift 25 lbs., push a wheelbarrow load of mulch, and have flexibility for weeding, etc. If you are uncertain of your physical abilities or concerned about your health, we can work on other opportunities for you.
Ready to join?
Please fill out the form below and we look forward to seeing you around the garden!