Gardening – A gift for nature

During the pandemic, visits to urban parks and public gardens and beaches soared, once again demonstrating how important green infrastructure is. Suddenly fresh air, green spaces, bird song and the lack of vehicle noise was a thing to be treasured. Simply being able to access parks and trees helps reduce blood pressure, adrenaline, and cortisol – major stress hormones.

Globally, forests still cover approximately 30 percent of our land area, but with the rate of tree cutting taking place, even on the Hibiscus Coast, trees are disappearing at an alarming rate.

Trees are nearly a quarter carbon, and this means as they grow, they trap almost four times their weight in carbon dioxide. They absorb the CO2 we exhale and trap the industrial greenhouse gases we emit. Simply by planting a new tree, you are responsible for nature absorbing more CO2 emissions.

Trees are the lungs of the Earth absorbing pollutants and improving air quality, acting like a filter for our pollution. Thankfully they produce oxygen which we need to survive.

Only in the 20th Century, when demand for wood skyrocketed did we start planting trees in an organised fashion. In NZ we are rushing to plant trees but almost no attention is being paid to which trees or why they are being planted. Planting trees that grow quickly so they can be cut down in a few years, is not a solution to either deforestation or sustainable timber, and planting a monoculture disregards the need for a diverse mixture of native species.

You can never be sure that trees growing on public land will always be there, so plant as many as you can in your garden, especially fruit trees, and then make sure you prune them to a size that allows you to benefit from their bounty. Or if your area is small there are many delightful new dwarf fruit trees available.

When we moved to Manly there was not a single tree on our property, now we have nearly 40, providing a peaceful, sheltered, and cool area for outdoor Christmas functions. A few natives underplanted, with kaka beak in tubs, provide for the native birds, while a selection of fruit bearing trees and bananas provide fruit year-round. Small fruit, raspberries, red currents, blueberries, and strawberries, are in containers and tubs tucked in along fencelines.

Once again, this Christmas the family know that the best gift will be a voucher that allows me to buy more plants!

Garden wreaths
If you can bend and shape it, any semi-woody stemmed vine will work to make wreaths. When pruning my grapevine, I gather long lengths for wreath making, craft them into shape while they are still green, removing leaves and bunching into a circular shape to the desired thickness. I bind securely with florist wire and hang up the circles to dry. Thin willow, honeysuckle and wisteria also work well. Sprigs of bay leaves, artemisia, pine needles, rosemary, and lavender can be used to build the bed of the wreath, held in place with ribbons or florists’ wire or tucked into the dried vines. Arrange groups of different herbs or garden flowers on top of the leaves and weave their stems around the grapevine.  Get creative with a glue gun and toothpicks, or little net bags to trim with clusters of cinnamon sticks, nutmegs, red chillies.  Use small mandarins to make pomanders, decorated with ribbon and attach near the top to resemble bells.