ARBORETUM
Self Guided Walks
A range of self-guided walks are being developed as part of the Arboretum. More walks will be planned in the future to showcase interesting plants and to link with relevant museum collections and areas of research.
Our latest walk is a sensory walk of the campus, focusing on smell.
Campus Loop
The Campus Loop is a pleasant walk around campus that will take you past a selection of the most interesting trees and other plants. It is ideal for new students, visitors and veterans of Macquarie University who are interested in finding out more about our beautiful, green campus.
Download notes for the self-guided walk here.
Campus History Walk
This walk plots the history of the Macquarie University campus from Sydney Turpentine-Ironbark Forest and the traditional custodians of the land, to thriving market gardens, to the development of the university. Many of the trees on campus have stories behind them. They are legacies of the passion, interests and dedication of staff and students who have gone beyond their normal jobs and research to make the university site the beautiful and fascinating campus it is today.
Download notes for the self-guided walk here.
Plant Evolution Walk
This walk showcases the evolutionary history of plants and incorporates both the Frank Mercer and Jim Rose gardens. It covers the major advances in plant evolution, from their ancestral beginnings through to the special adaptations found in Australian plants. Most plants featured on this walk will have remained relatively unchanged for millions of years - they look almost idenitical to very old fossils. It provides an opportunity to explore plant evolution through extant (still living) plants. This walk moves from plants with the most ancestral (oldest) plant forms to the most recently evolved, highlighting significant advances in plant form and function.
This walk is marked with signs and begins on Science Road on the northern side of E8B. There is also an audio version with activity sheets for undergraduate classes, available on request.
Plant Vampires Walk
Plants are just harmless, inactive, green things, right? Wrong! Parasitic plants penetrate and absorb food from other plants and carnivorous plants catch and digest insects as a source of nutrients! A surprisingly large number of these can be found in the Ecology Reserve, on the northern side of the M2. If you look carefully, you might be able to hunt down quite a few species of plant vampires!
Download notes for the self-guided walk here.
High res version (better images)
here (nb this file is large 4.5Mb).
Sensory Walk - Follow Your Nose Tour
Follow your nose around campus with a self-guided tour of botanical smells. In this tour, you'll find the special smells of the Australian bush, as well as some of our sweetest flowers.
Download the notes for the self-guided tour here.
Sculpture Park
As you walk through the Arboretum you will encounter many beautiful and interesting sculptures. These form the Macquarie University Sculpture Park.
http://www.mq.edu.au/about/campus-services-and-facilities/museums-and-collections/macquarie-university-art-gallery/plan-a-visit#tours