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Tours & Activities

Whether you would like to add a nature walk to your corporate booking, bring your garden club for a guided tour, or enhance the experience of college learners, contact the Humber Arboretum to discuss the possibilities for your group.

Available Activities

nature walk

Nature Walk

An experienced nature educator will bring you through the trails of the Arboretum, giving you up close and personal experience with our unique Carolinian bioregion. The Humber Arboretum covers approximately 250 acres and includes woodland trails, meadows, and the western branch of the Humber River. This tour is a perfect way to take in a world of beauty and have an interactive experience with nature. You can choose to customize your tour with a focus such as conservation efforts, local wildlife, notable trees, or seasonal topics such as maple syrup production or snowshoeing. 

garden tours

Garden Tour

Choose to focus on the Humber Arboretum’s botanical gardens. Discover theme gardens such as the Garden of the Rising Moon, the Bird Tranquility Garden, or the Humber Food Learning Garden, along with the seasonally blooming annuals and perennials. Our labelled collection of trees and shrubs can introduce you to specimens from here at home and around the world.

sustainable building tour

Sustainable Building Tour

Learn about environmental building technology. Located in the Humber Arboretum, the Centre for Urban Ecology is a facility that demonstrates how we can work towards creating a sustainable environment in our own urban spaces. This building has achieved the LEED® (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) Gold Certification, which distinguishes building projects that have demonstrated a commitment to sustainability by meeting the highest performance standards.

customizable workshops

Customized Workshops

Is your group interested in connecting children with nature, or topics such as pollinators, birds, ecosystems, or the Humber River? Our environmental education staff may be able to offer a customized workshop tied to your interests. Take a look at our school programs page for even more ideas.

A natural shelter made from sticks and pine needles

Ecological Team Building

This interactive program consists of leadership building, as well as character and teamwork skill improvement. Each activity will focus on a variety of skills, including communication, cooperation, and planning. You can choose how many events will be part of the programming. Options include shelter building, scavenger hunts, the leaf match challenge, natural raft races, the egg drop challenge, dam building, and planting events.

Work as one group to collect natural materials and construct a sturdy lean-to in the woods.

Break into teams to find and identify objects in nature. Your hunt can explore different ecosystems such as the wetland, river, meadow, forest, and gardens, or choose a themed scavenger hunt to have your group focus in on a feature such as soils, trees, or plants.

Teams must design and build a case using only natural materials that can protect an egg during a fall.

Teams are given a set of leaves and head out in a race to find and collect a matching set from the trees and plants around the site. We can adjust the level of difficulty to suit your group.

Work in teams to design and build a raft out of natural, found materials then see which raft fares best in a race down the Humber River.

Teams work together to collect natural materials and build a structure that holds up against the flow of water.

Become nature stewards for the day! Let your team work together on a different kind of project and discover the satisfaction of planting native trees, shrubs or other plants on the grounds of the Arboretum. Our staff will show you correct planting technique and give you information on the species you're planting and how they will benefit the natural environment. Then it's time to get down and dirty! 

A woman plants a tree in a meadow