GARDENERS ATLAS

Field Notes: Lawn Research 1

I am interested in alternatives to the traditional grass lawn. As grass needs to grow to a certain height until it flowers it is usually cut before then. Plants that grow lower and flower earlier therefore negate the need for mowing and ensure a far longer flowering period. This opens up the possibilities for lawns of many species of flowering plant. I also have the feeling that without the dense thatch layer and fibrous rooting that lawns often build up, there is more interface between the air and soil. More niches for insects to occupy and better interchange of water. My ongoing experiments in my own garden with lawn alternatives are documented in the 4x7 project.

Mixed Sedum with gravel in an old hanging planter

Gravel colonised by Self-Heal (Prunella vulgaris)

Moss, liverwort and Ivy

St. Andrews Botanic Garden, Scotland - Slightly overgrown rock garden but interesting to see the natural development of low growing perennials

St. Andrews Botanic Garden, Scotland

Rain Diary: 04/06/25

04/06/25 - 15:03

Heavy June rain in the Annesley Walled Garden at Castlewellan Arboretum.

Field Notes: Loch Leven Nature Reserve, Perth and Kinross

Field Notes: Feshie Bridge Woodlands - Highland, Scotland

Rain Diary: 11/05/23

Clearance in the Winter Garden at Castlewellan Arboretum (11/05/23)

Blueberries (Vaccinium corymbosum)

Bluberries (Vaccinium corymbosum) are a relatively hardy no nonsense fruit to grow. To me the Bluberry stands on its own as a shrub in its own right, being relatively small and almost bonsai in habit. Particularly if you are concerned about fruit then pruning will be on your mind which will keep it in pretty good shape over the years. Before the fruits come there are the beautiful small bell flowers so characteristic of the Ericaceae family. In autumn the leaves turn a fiery red. Grow multiple bushes together to increase fruit set. Remember an ericaceous compost or something similar as like many plants in the Ericaceae, they tend to be adapted for acidic soils.

In future I will post about some experiments with the native European blueberry, Vaccinium myrtilus, or as I know it back home in Scotland 'blaeberry'. This grows as a very small shrub and has proven difficult to cultivate in the garden.

Pea Shoots

[Pea shoots just need a damp material to sit on, a fairly moderate temperature, and some decent sunlight]

I was drawn to the murky world of OOO (Object-Oriented Ontology) a little while back. Particularly the ‘ecological’ slant taken by Timothy Morton in books such as The Ecological Thought and Dark Ecology. I was attracted because here was an aesthetic dimension to considering environment that accounted for the strangeness and melancholy we often feel in the face of it.

Practical knowledge of the systems that sustain us on Earth must surely make for the foundation of our ecological philosophies/politics. And yet we can’t forget the strangeness that is being a conscious living thing on this planet.

It gets pretty interesting in that third place between the pragmatic ecological and the oblique aesthetic dimensions of life.
__________________________

ref 1.