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My emphasis

Intersectional Gardening

Beyond the forest garden

Jake Rayson smiling

by Jake Rayson

natureworks.org.uk
natureworks.org.uk/talks/intersectional

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“It’s time to expand our vision past supporting birds, butterflies and bees, and fully integrate the most challenging animal of all, the human being, into our native plant gardens”

~ Jared Rosenbaum, Wild Plant Culture

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My emphasis

Why are we here?

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  • Let‘s start with the big questions

Climate Emergency

Koala on tree with wildfire in background

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  • 1.5°C rise by 2026, 6-7°C by 2100
  • Photo by Matthew Abbott/The New York Times, labelled for reuse

 

And don’t forget the…

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Ecological Emergency

Koala on tree with wildfire in background

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Forest garden

Screengrab of forest garden video

Productive
Sustainable
Low maintenance

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  • Tough on climate change, tough on the causes of climate change - to misquote Tony Blair

“A self-nourishing
wildlife orchard underplanted with
edible shrubs and
perennial vegetables.”

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Close-up of hazel nuts on the tree

A forest garden is
an edible ecosystem

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As it's an edible ecosystem, grow native plants!!

Close-up of hoverfly on composite flowers

Provide habitat for wildlife
& food for everyone

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The intersectional garden

Venn diagram: wildlife, edible & ornamental gardens intersecting in forest garden

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Frothy white flowers on stems, yellow flowers below, purplish grass flowers beyond

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Beyond the self

Circles within circles: Self, Friends, Everyone

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Beyond the human

Circles within circles: Anthropocentric, Biocentric, Ecocentric

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When I first started forest gardening, I said "I'm not planting anything unless I can eat it".

Native plants

Big white shrub flowers

  • Grow native plants where possible
  • because they have co-evolved
  • to be eaten by insect larvae
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  • Bottom line, insects eat native plants
  • See Database of Insects and their Food Plants
  • The bulk of plants native, eg in windbreaks as ground cover
  • Near-natives and nativars
  • Key point, ecosystems (whole plant communities) are resilient

Habitat diversity

Newly built stone filled gabion

  • Pond, hedges, trees, log piles, stone piles…
  • Different substrates
  • Human interaction
  • See John Little wildlife gardener
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Species diversity

Tapestry of wild flowers in a field

  • Non-native edibles
  • Native hedging & ground cover
  • Habitat diversity ⇝ species diversity
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Tapestry of wild flowers in a field

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“integrate the most challenging animal of all”

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The Human

Close-up of baby's brown eye

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Human design

Roundwood pergola in newly created garden

  • Design paths & areas
  • Build-in habitat & species diversity
  • Interaction can improve habitat
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Tending the Wild

Cover of book, Tending the Wild by Kat Anderson

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  • It can be done!
  • Coppicing is classic example of human intervention beneficially creating diversity of habitat, constantly re-creating “woodland edge”

Ornamental natives

Tall spires of pink-purple foxgloves

  • Cues to care
  • Invite people in
  • Participatory relationship with nature¹
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  • ¹ Tending the Wild pp338

Orange butterfly on white umbellifer flower

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  • Wild Angelica (Angelica sylvestris) and a Silver-washed Fritillary (Argynnis paphia)

Small blue-violet flowers

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  • Dog Violet (Viola canina), larval food plant for Silver-washed Fritillary (Argynnis paphia)

Close-up of open white flower

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  • Marsh mallow (Althaea officinalis)

Close-up of side of thin elegant pink flower

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  • Corncockle (Agrostemma githago)

Close-up umbellifer type white flowers

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  • Yarrow (Achillea millefolium)

Resources

Screenshot of flower image database

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Beyond the forest garden

Circles within circles: Your garden, Community garden, The landscape

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  • Beyond the intersectional garden
  • Beyond the cult of the individual
  • Out into the world
  • The best gardens connect with the landscape

Wildlife Allotments

Wind turbine, community gardens

  • Climate resilience
  • Collective action
  • Back door community forest garden
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Photo is Birmingham & Black Country Wildlife Trust, now creating a community forest garden

Time to get angry

Small yellow bird standing on mud

“capitalism is the cause of the Yellowhammer’s decline”

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Time to Get Angry: Beyond the Cosy Consensus in British Nature Conservation by Jonathan Deane

A forest garden is everything

Omega symbol

Productive
Sustainable
Low maintenance

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A forest garden is not enough

Extinction Rebellion symbol

Climate Justice
Collective action
Political change

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Can't talk about Climate Emergency without talking about Climate Justice

“Biological diversity will not be sustained
if new ways of managing nature do not
also transform how we experience
our place in nature”

~ Edward Grumbine, Ghost Bears

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pp238

The End

Small white flowers of Sweet Woodruff

hello@natureworks.org.uk

natureworks.org.uk/newsletter

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“It’s time to expand our vision past supporting birds, butterflies and bees, and fully integrate the most challenging animal of all, the human being, into our native plant gardens”

~ Jared Rosenbaum, Wild Plant Culture

2 / 36

My emphasis

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