Monday, June 13, 2011

Ethical dilemmas of the gardening kind

When I started gardening as a child, life was simple. There were no ethical or moral decisions I had to make, I just planted my seeds, got excited when they started to grow and enjoyed seeing the results of my efforts. There was no talk of global warming, dying bees or Japanese knotweed. There were plenty of bomb sites with what we fondly called weeds (sorry, wildflowers) and life tended to be a bit grey in colour but overall gardeners were not that troubled with moral dilemmas.

As I got older and family came along I enjoyed involving them in the daily round of planting, weeding and watering. It was also fun to see their delight when the seeds they planted grew.

Today, however, now in the ‘autumn of my years’ as Frank Sinatra so aptly put it, I am faced with all kinds of ethical and moral dilemma and gardening is no longer the easy pleasure it once was - well not if I care about the environment that is.

I recently read an excellent article in The Telegraph by Mark Diacono on the ethical dilemma of using peat. I stopped using peat about seven years ago as a result of a National Trust campaign. I can’t say either myself or the garden has noticed this deficit. I totally agree with one observation that some of our addictions in the garden are the result of no more than clever marketing. The add men tell us that we must use this or that to achieve a perfect result and we become conditioned. Many of us have forgotten how to make good old fashioned compost and rely instead on buying many of the branded varieties now adorning our garden centres. That said, if you really don’t want to make your own compost there are plenty of peat-free varieties available such as New Horizon Organic that can be bought ready made.

According to the RHS almost 70% of peat sold in the UK is used by amateur gardeners. The RHS itself only uses peat based material for propagation of plants and maintenance of a small number of specialist plant collections but they, like the National Trust, strive towards a totally peat-free future.

So gardening dilemma number one is whether or not to use peat!

Then there is the thorny issue of global warming and sustainable gardening. A lot has been said about sustainable gardening over the last few years. I confess to not having heard the phrase ‘sustainable gardening’ until about four or five years ago. The Royal Horticultural Society (RHS) urges us to garden in a sustainable way - there is even a special section devoted to this on their website - www.rhs.org.uk/Gardening/Sustainable-gardening

The RHS give a very good breakdown on why and how climate change affects our gardens and what we can do to help reduce the greenhouse effect. They also produce leaflets to help us combine benefits for the environment with practical gardening. You can’t bury your head in the sand any longer folks - RHS Flower Shows have had lots of ‘sustainable gardens’ to inspire the rest of us and the word ‘sustainable’ seems to punctuate every gardening article we currently read! I can no longer feign ignorance.

So dilemma number two is ‘how can I garden in a sustainable way to help the climate?’

Now gardening dilemma number three - how can I help wildlife in my garden and in particular make my garden a happy place for bees?

By now I am becoming slightly paranoid as another dimension is added into the mix. My simple sowing, growing and enjoying is turning into a ‘Kafkaesque’ experience! I want my garden to be a paradise for bees, a Monaco in the sun where they can buzz happily till their hearts content but I also want it to be a happy place for me as well, so are the two compatible? My dilemma is made worse by that lovely Sarah Raven who wrote recently that if we want to help bees and butterflies we should avoid Chelsea’s bright blooms! Hell, I love my bright blooms, my Gertrude Jekyll style of planting and my bright and blowsy cottage garden. Reading on it was not quite as bad as the headline made it sound. She advocates that we avoid plants with thick multi petals which make it dificult for bees to reach for pollen and nectar and choose instead more native plants such as primroses, single dahlias and wild roses which are rich in pollen and nectar.

So its back to the good old RHS for their ‘Perfect for Pollinators Plant List’, which gives the best flowers for insects and we can all rest in our beds (flower that is) because armed with the RHS list and a new ‘bee friendly’ label (which will now help gardeners to choose the right plants to help hoverflies, bees and butterflies) we should all be able to make the right decisions. Phew!

Dilemma number four - to be or not to be organic!

Here again I try to be organic but I am not totally so. I really got into the organic thing by way of HRH Prince Charles. No I’m not name dropping, I have only met the gentleman once (a pleasure I might add, he really loves gardening) - it was really as a result of reading his book about Highgrove that got me interested in organic gardening. I can understand why HRH is so passionate about organic gardening BUT and its a big but, I find it hard to really follow all the principles although I have been astounded by several totally organic gardens I have visited and not a greenfly in sight.

So times are changing - one of the recommendations in a recent Government White Paper   on the environment suggests banning the use of peat by amateur gardeners by 2020. Recent research by the RHS confirmed the vital role played by gardens in reducing city warming - plants bring down energy consumption in winter by providing shelter and insulation, cools the air in towns and cities in hot weather and reduces the risk of flooding by absorbing rain.

There is plenty of research to prove that gardening is beneficial to us in many ways, both physical and mental and can have very therapeutic properties - that nothwithstanding, I have to say that I am becoming increasingly anguished at all the factors I now have to consider just by putting my trowel into the ground.

It was so easy in the 1950’s, there was Miss Marple, weeds (sorry, wildflowers) growing on bomb sites, red buses which ran really regularly, no motorways and yes 6d could get you a good seat at the Saturday matinee. But life moves on - now I use an iphone, an ipad and a pc in my everyday life and just as I have accepted those technological innovations, I suspect I must now adjust to global warming, peat free environments and bee friendly flowers in my gardening life.




RHS Chelsea Flower Show 2011 - Royal Bank of Canada New Wild Garden (bug hotel wall)



I’m not totally sure if I will ever ‘get’ the sustainable thingy but I will rest happy if my flowers bloom, my bees buzz and I can sit and enjoy a gin and tonic on my patio being smug in the knowledged that I have helped save the planet if only in a very, very small way.

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