Gilbert White - A voice from the past

Photo courtesy of Wikipedia contributor

Gilbert White's Contribution to Gardens -

He was born in Selborne, Hampshire, England in 1720. Another phenologist and recorder of nature he is so worth reading at regular intervals. His diaries on natural history, ecology, landscaping, and also the relationship between plants and animals have been pioneering documents because of his extraordinary capacity for observation and recording.

He also worked with William Markwick (born 1739) on identifying and cataloguing many birds of the area. so between them their contribution has been immense.

So far the greatest jewel I have discovered on the internet in respect of this subject ( and something I will pursue further) is the Gutenberg Project which provides a FREE downloadable e-text of “The Natural History of Selborne” by Gilbert White based on a series of letters mainly to Thomas Pennant, the top zoologist at this time..Nothing can beat the original text for a sense of time and place and a tool to anchor us in our present day lives to the not so far away “Then” . Consider his description of the effects of the weather in 1780 for instance in his first letter when he describes a severe hot summer and a preceding dry spring and winter when the ponds dried and the wells failed... so familiar to my ears and eyes in this year 2009.... the fall of a huge important oak tree brought down in a big storm and attempts to recover it.

The wikipedia entry from Gilbert White reminded me of this comment which we should forget at our peril. I know I wish my garden had some of these (not so) common earthworms:

"............Earthworms, though in appearance a small and despicable link in the chain of nature, yet, if lost, would make a lamentable chasm [...] worms seem to be the great promoters of vegetation, which would proceed but lamely without them..."

Links

www.gilbertwhiteshouse.org.uk

www.theaa.com In-the-footsteps-of-gilbert-white-at-selborne-420525

here is quite a useful reference from AA (Automobile Association) if you would like to walk “In the footsteps of Gilbert White” about 5 kilometers long and walkable with dogs on leads which has got to be a plus.

My Garden and I - September and a glut of fruit

Having let the last two weeks slip somewhat in the garden we are faced with a glut of our staple fruits. Last year's fig preserves were a great success but do you think I can find the recipe which I had carefully squirreled away?
So I made a guess and overcooked my first lot. Like baking one should not be trying this when a little below par..... Having binned that attempt I went back to the internet and did some more research. I was also wanting to check the charts reference altitude cooking as one must allow a little extra time for the standard English jam/preserve recipe.

I had cottoned on to this problem because here in Spain I never seemed to have a good cup of tea despite appearing to adhere to the normal rules of tea making. I finally had to come to the conclusion that the water was not getting hot enough and checked this out on the internet.

Many people do not realise that Spain is in effect the highest country of Europe after Swizerland. The highest of Iberia's mountains is down the road in the Sierra Nevada – Mulhacen at 3479 meters.
Generally northern Spain is at an average of 800 meters above sea level and southern Spain averages 400 meters. We live at 750 meters.

This charts the difference in boiling point at a variety of altitudes:

Alt in ft Alt in mtrs Boiling pt F. Boiling pt C.

< 0 0 212.0 100.0
500 152 211.0 99.4
1000 305 210.0 98.9
2000 610 208.2 97.9
3000 914 206.2 96.8
4000 1219 204.4 95.8
5000 1524 202.6 94.8
6000 1829 200.7 93.7
7000 2134 198.7 92.6
8000 2438 196.9 91.6
10000 3048 194.0 90.0
12500 3810 189.8 87.7

Because of the changes in air pressure food starts to bubble before reaching boiling point at sea level. This has implications for a lot of food preparation and preservation.

The point of all this is, it is very often necessary to cook jams and say, chips in fat, for some minutes longer and possibly invest in a pressure cooker if in Spain. You may need to experiment with baking as well.

My garden in August

It rained...
for 45 minutes.....

Amazing how it greens things up and rescues us from the risk of bush fires though. Bad year here with the loss of a number of spanish firefighters.
All that aside, the growth and ripening of all the summer crops is well advanced and we have started picking our mammoth crop of almonds at least a week early. Crops are dropping in local fields as they remain unpicked because of the big August Holiday so the boar and foxes are truly having a field day - get it?
Most spanish people flock to the coast for most of August quite sensibly but it does mean it is hard to get anything meaningful achieved at this time. I can get a little annoyed with other nationalities who come and expect to achieve big things in the month of August and then return to their native countries complaining about the spanish people and their manana culture. People should take note of the temperatures here which have been well in excess of 42 degrees C.


Managing our fig crop

I have been positively over the moon about eating our own grapes and honeydew melons as well as courgettes and pumpkins this year. I found an ace site on the internet which said that pumpkins make great chutney which lasts and lasts, so I mixed two recipes for chutney to use my ripening figs to make a very tasty "Susie's Kitchen Chutney". I will also make fig preserve which was a big hit last season.

I am drying black and green figs already. I have constructed my own box consisting of a black plastic tray which allows air through it and lined it with some mosquito net material to keep the insects and birds off them. The figs are laid out without touching each other. Hopefully they should dry in a couple of days in this heat. Prickly pears are already ripe (this is actually another form of fig) Prickly pear leaf pads break down to make an excellent composting material too.
Interestingly I seem to be growing wheat in the nearly prepared raised bed filled with straw and horse manure.......

Where are the bees?

The most worrying feature apart from the increase in temperature this summer is that there are hardly any bees and wasps around this year. Now up til now I havent heard of the local bee keepers complaining about problems so this is merely an observation at this point.

Bits and bobs

I have received my tree and bush propogation pots from Lee Gardens in Canada - of course one should really start things off in the Spring... and my summer sale seeds from secretseeds.co.uk in Tiverton. The penstemons, corriander and rhubarb I planted on my return from UK are up and running. I am also drying off seeds from the root crops etc for next season's planting. Word of advice from the newly wise - make sure you label well as you wont remember what is what when it comes to planting up seeds later on.

It can get quite chilly in the early hours so we are experiencing the greatest daily temperature variations so we need to be on our guard.

The German Garden - 2

I fall over the most interesting and excellent insights into the European World as it is whilst bringing myself up to speed on something that has galvanised me. Having written a little about West Germany - the one I knew about - I wanted to look at the gardens of East Germany - where I wasnt allowed to go - in the 70s. Some fascinating material around but it was the paper by Elizabeth Meyer Renschausen called "Geese in the Garden" which brought me the greatest insights especially into small holdings, allotments and private vegetable gardens and just as in UK economically difficult times leads to a greater interest in vegetable growing and allotments. She gave a paper in USA in 2002 and in it she has a good stab at defining "Small Holder" and "Vegetable Gardener" and how they can overlap....
But the statistic she quotes which puts so much into focus for Germany, its agriculture and the people in the east is this:
"The rapid integration of the GDR (the former East Germany) into the Federal Republic of Germany (the former West Germany) threw 89 percent of those employed in agriculture out of their jobs as early as 1990/91..............Up to two thirds of those unemployed or at most temporarily employed are women. " This was an excellent read.

What she describes is how the Peasant Wife - women's contribution to the agricultural economy - has become such a vital factor as a second and important source of boosting their livelihood either directly by producing food for the family's consumption or as part of the barter economy/payment in kind.
While many such women would prefer waged work because of its social connectivity to others they are aware that the food they grow "...simply tastes better...."

During the difficult years since the wall came down hobby farms and gardens have given many people in the provinces of eastern Germany a way of holding on to a valued sense of meaningful activity, usefulness rather than slipping into feelings of helplessness, grandparents supplying fresh produce for children and even grand children. In fact there has been an attempt to re-evaluate the future of Self Work suggesting that policy makers acknowledge and encourage self-help initiatives.

Dessau - Goethe was apparently totally inspired by Dessau. The formal gardens there are stunning and important to the whole of Europe and the world. In 2000 it was included as a UNESCO World Heritage site. (Leopold III Frederick Franz, Duke of Anhalt-Dessau (b. Dessau, 10 August 1740 - d. Schloss Luisium near Dessau, 9 August 1817 - Wikipedia) and generally known as Prince Franz began its development in the 18th Century, the golden age of formal gardens and much influenced by England and France's gardens.

Gartz on the Oder - near the Polish border gets talked about in "Geese in the Garden" but it is worth remembering that this town is in the one of Germany's National Parks - the lower Oder National Park.

Dresden - so badly bombed in World War Two by the British developed its gardens out of necessity fundamentally on bomb sites. Dresden has started a multicultural garden project I remember being told by a german friend who lived in the country and visited her mother in war-torn Berlin at the end; how she had sat on a bench to eat her lunch and being watched by half starved city people.

Leipzig seems inordinately important if you are physically or virtually interested in gardens of all kinds. The Leipzig Tourism site is in three languages and worth a visit for starters. They have superb photos to tempt and is a good place to start investigating their allotment gardens too.
Lovers of this area included Goethe:
- Goethe in Faust "Mein Leipzig lob' ich mir! Es ist ein klein Paris und bildet seine Leute. (I praise my Leipzig! It is a small Paris and educates its people."


Notes

I include this definition which has come out of many conference on sustainability - SARD (Sustainable Agriculture and Rural Development) as a process which meets the following criteria:

* Ensures that the basic nutritional requirements of present and future generations, qualitatively and quantitatively, are met while providing a number of other agricultural products.
* Provides durable employment, sufficient income, and decent living and working conditions for all those engaged in agricultural production.
* Maintains and, where possible, enhances the productive capacity of the natural resource base as a whole, and the regenerative capacity of renewable resources, without disrupting the functioning of basic ecological cycles and natural balances, destroying the socio-cultural attributes of rural communities, or causing contamination of the environment.
* Reduces the vulnerability of the agricultural sector to adverse natural and socio-economic factors and other risks, and strengthens self-reliance.

Postscript to Allotments UK

On that really great programme "You and Yours" (BBCRadio4)today there was an interesting article on Manchester Community Allotments Project (see http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/youandyours/items/02/2009_20_fri.shtml) which led me on to check out their website for other interesting bits...
There are photos on line to follow their progress.

This one is about schools putting aside a little piece of land to give children hands on experience at growing and then eating...
hhttp://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/youandyours/items/01/2009_21_wed.shtml

and this item is interesting about how councils are pursuing people when there allotments remain uncultivated when and how "... local authorities can meet the challenge of more than eighty thousand people waiting for an allotment."
http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/youandyours/items/03/2009_22_fri.shtml

The German Garden - 1

Germany's population's lives is very much apartment-based and use of public space for social use is a central plank in policy. Here is a first go at looking at some of their formal gardens and a little of their history.

Hanover-
Herrenhausen Gardens - formal gardens in Hanover. Capitol of Lower Saxony, and closely linked to the Hanoverians. Thus directly to the English kings and queens of the 20^th century.The gardens were strongly influenced by the English Garden which was de rigeur architecturally and botanically in the 18^th century.

Immaculate formal gardens which at the time did not sit well with me as it meant you were not able to walk on the grass which kind of defeated the idea of a garden for me. However Germany makes up for this with their thousands of wanderwegs** I suppose.

Not very far away is -Schloss Schwoebber (now a hotel with golf course and other amenities) but I lived within the castle for nearly two years in the 70s). The castle was surrounded by an English Garden which has become synonymous with an informally landscaped garden perfected by Capability Brown in a number of famous parks in Britain. The park was full of specimen trees, the schloss edged with a lake, swans, a tea house and an ice house below it.

This castle has a very strong literary connection as the castle had originally belonged to Baron von Muenchausen.

- The tea house set in the English Garden is a gardening preference that gets copied all over fashionable gardens of the 18^th Century. George Washington's home showed his passion for gardening and Thomas Madison 's home has the most delightful teahouse over the ice house. In USA. These connections come together in a spectacular way in

Munich

which has a classic and huge English Garden (Englischer Garten), This equates with Richmond Park near London and Central Park in New York.

It owes its development and style to an American soldier Benjamen Thompson, born in Massachusetts and who fought on the English side. After their defeat in USA he moved in to the service of Carl Theodor. An interesting collaboration which actively had soldiers gardening and learning methods of agriculture in order to create recreation areas which would also be open to the public. In 1789 Friedrich von Sckell the Royal Gardener became consultant to the project. Von Sckell had studied landscape gardening in England and we begin to see how these gardening ideas got to be repeated all over Europe and beyond.

Nowadays the Englisher Garten has a Japanese Teehaus and one park of the park where nude bathing is permitted. And there is a standing wave for surfers..... the ultimate in water features?

Berlin - Botanical Garden in Berlin

Dessau - The Garden Kingdom of Desau-Worlitz - more of which anon

Potsdam - botanical garden can be found the Orangery Palace

**Wanderwegs are well marked walks through woodlands etc.

View Larger Map

Allotments - Spain

Whilst researching various topics I have come across a number of references to academic studies and the promotion or otherwise of what we must translate as public allotments. This piece of research done by Geography Department of Barcelona University I discovered on a site "City Farmers" (See (1) below - a title I like and may be a better way of looking at the issue these days. However here we have data on "vegetable gardens" in the Metropolitan Region of Barcelona. At the time of the research 132 plot holders were interviewed. Their characteristics generally were of post-retirement working class men who had migrated to the region and used their gardens for what appears to be a mixed and common set of aims for many allotment holders in Europe ie supporting their families with extra food, a social element and a general bonding which keeps rural traditions alive.
The authors go on to say though that there is a contradiction in public policies between those who would eliminate these urban gardens and the "greening of the city" and policies of sustainability. Where have we heard that before?
There is a great deal of evidence I could drag on to this site which shows that private business interests will succeed over public and neighbourhood policies but I wont bore you with it... except to say that image promotion of a potential Olympic city draws out promises given to the indigenous population not necessarily implemented by planners (Barcelona, Athens - so watch out London!) and to quote what I consider to be an important pointer to the future in this quote (2) :

"One particular case of urban agriculture is allotments located in public land in periurban areas. Although they are considered as marginal in areas such as the Barcelona metropolis, this is one activity which, if carefully regulated and even suitably promoted, can contribute to structuring peri-urban areas, generating laudable landscapes and satisfying the needs of many people. Examples of this can be seen in the outskirts of many central and northern European towns and cities. Private allotments can be compatible with traditional open spaces or incorporated into new metropolitan open spaces.Transforming this avocation, removing it from marginal spaces and relocatingit in suitable locations where it can be regulated, is something which needs to be done, but we can also see it as a good solution to shaping to our open spaces. Many European cities are going back to the policy of including allotments in public parks, thus reclaiming the tradition begun in Germany at the end of the 19th century."

There is very little mention in the literature of any other sensible town and public policy for Spain other than Barcelona. I believe Valencia has made some moves in this direction. However I was intrigued when I heard that some of the Spanish "townies" had been asking around for available plots of unworked land. Maybe there is change in the wind here as well.....

References
1.
http://www.cityfarmer.info/urbanization-and-class-produced-natures-vegetable-gardens-in-the-barcelona-metropolitan-region-mrb-spain/

2.
http://ddd.uab.cat/pub/prmb/18883621n47p91.pdf

Allotments - UK

Having just spent a week around my old stamping ground in UK, and despite mid July weather ie wet and cold, I made a visit with my friends to a city allotment area in Southampton which I had previously only vaguely been aware of. They now have a good little vegetable patch which has been a pretty steep learning curve for them over the last year. However there is apparently a lovely communality among the allotment holders and generally someone has put them right.

I got to eat kale and sprouting broccoli and raspberries with red currants for supper that night and jolly nice it was too.Tucked away with a substantial wooded area there are deer hiding close by ready to eat anything the holders leave unprotected for their delectation. There are some things which they just don't seem to like which must be one up for the allotment holders:

French marigolds with everything....

There was a substantial variation in the layout and general upkeep of what must be around a hundred lots. Some were gems of gardens with seats in secluded areas, mown lawns, neat raised beds, companion plantings, composting of course and vast piles of manure. I found myself absorbing small ideas from each area to possibly apply back in my spanish vegetable plot. Some of the gardens had a few chickens in what must be good pickings for city foxes if anyone fails to estimate how good they are at getting in or over fences and other devices..

Useful sites

www.allotment.org.uk - load of information and pictures and a source of answers to your problems

www.irishallotments.net -for Ireland

www.allotments.net - Cambridge allotments site -

thinking laterally this is of course an area associated with the fertile rump of Britain where they have been foremost in producing food in bulk. Lincoln. Norfolk and so on....

Three examples of structural cacti in a garden near Aguilas

Hampton Court Flower Show

I am not there again. Every year I promise to get myself there but things defeat me. Interesting tv coverage though... concept gardens are fascinating but again worth picking up ideas from the sustainable garden project. A HUGE site.

I loved the water chain and I am wondering how I can apply that out here in Murcia. It's a way of a large chain taking water off a roof garden and the overflow drips down into an interesting reservoir and then the chain reaches down to the earth and just gets absorbed into the ground.

Plants are very structural and generally can look after themselves whatever the weather. In fact if I hadnt known better these could have been gardens in the Levante Spain - have a look at the next item.

http://suevista.blogspot.com/2009/07/three-examples-of-structural-cacti-in.html

Italy again

I wonder if Italy has the record for Botanical gardens. The official website Italia has a complete list - about thirty seven. In Rome there is Ninfa and, also a really great idea, Latium in the heart of (Travestere) which is a 'scent and touch' garden for the visually impaired.

The first was... you've got it .... the Vatican's in the 13th century; Salerno's dates from the 14th century and Padua, Pisa and Florence - the Giadino dei Semplici - all date from the 16th century. However it was the 18th -19th centuries when these botanical gardens were mainly developed.
The University gardens in Catania, Sicily has a garden specifically dealing with the flora of the volcanic soil. Turin in Piedmont is very important as a centre of learning and study of Italian botany; their herbarium being second only to Florence.
And for those interested in such matters I found a couple of sites giving some of the patron saints of gardens and gardening.....

• St. Patrick for organic gardening
• St Fiacre for gardening
• St Francis for herbs and vegetables
• St Bernardo Abad is patron of the Beekeeper
• St Dorothy for fruit trees
  

I did find one piece on www.ecologicagardens.com about Italy which struck several vibrant chords with me. This writer is also very involved with design and structure as well and is best read in its entirety but here are some bits that caught my attention."... the roots of the authentic Italian garden have unknowingly displayed a surprising respect for the local landscape and native species within that landscape ..." Here is a photo I took outside the walls of Bavagna which really gives a sense of that.







The landscape is of course indomitable and I put up a photo of a visit to Umbria of my partner's sister and husband working hard on the slopes of their land to create a little piece for a vegetable garden.








If you stop for a minute to wipe your brow at least the view is a consolation.






And for a lovely fictional read connected with Umbria and a garden, how about William Trevor's "My House in Umbria" which can be found in Penguin Books 'Two Lives' (1992). If you cant be bothered to read then there is always the film which is lovely too.

"We must have a garden,' I had repeatedly said that winter and supring, saying it mainly to myself. 'It is ridiculous that a house like this does not have a garden to it.' ....One April passing through a railway station here in Italy I noticed a great display of azaleas in pots....Ever since I had longed for an azalea garden......"

My Five Successful gardening ploys for 2009

This idea came from a great blogsite I found while doing the "Great Problogger teach-in" this year. Tod's upside down planter has had a great following on the net for years and now I spot that Lakeland Plastics have a kit in their catalogue.

This cost me nothing; just stuff I had around - please note I have used a smaller bucket to Tod's idea.

I used the same plants in the same compost planted the same time in very hot southern Spain. The upside down planter has won hands down. Still not sure why it is so successful - airflow? gravity? Photo taken June 30th.

My other ploy this year is to use broken down prickly pear and old newspapers in a trough in my veggie garden before planting my melons, courgettes and pumpkin.This really seems to have held the water in the soil. Despite up to 40deg Centigrade we actually have something to show for the summer.

I have finally been convinced that raised gardens are a must and our September bed is now in preparation assisted by horse manure from a local riding school. Should be nicely ready for our winter plantings.

Being somewhat disabled I have come to love an old tool beloved of people around here - the Spanish hoe. Somehow with its shorter handle and heavy metal wide blade you can get some real force behind your controlled swing.

I have ordered an interesting gadget to help propagate trees and bushes which are expensive purchases and often have a heavy carbon footprint. Just so irritated that this is made in Spain and I cannot find a supplier other than an American one for this but in the long run I hope save.

It is a rooter pot and seems to be similar to the portuguese air layering system . I am grateful to Hannes on the Pete Beale Rose Community forum for this one.

Modern Italy - a first look

When most people think of Italy we think of a place as old as the hills literally and metaphorically with gardens conjured in the mind's eye of renaissance statuary and lush rolling hllls with cypresses pointing heavenwards – right and wrong.

The country we now know as Italy consisted of many powerful and autonomous states right up to 187?. Most of them forever fighting each other. Each with its own natural beauty, agricultural gifts and traditions built on timeless patterns of human activity with a lot of input from the natural world. Italy is split down the middle by a massive fault, with tectonic plates which are pushing the whole country toward iits neighbours across the Adriatics pitted with active volcanoes and constantly reminds us of the fact.

So let's remind ourselves of those elements which now constitute Italy.

Let us start with Rome and the Roman Empire. The Romans tried to steal and dominate most of Europe succeeding for the most part for nearly five hundred years. The power and might emanating from the seven hills of Rome. Not surprising therefore they left a mark on other lands.

And now Rome surrounds the enclave of the Papal State. Now there is a force to be reckoned with.

Map of Italy by Tourizm Maps © 2006
Florence, Genoa, Sienna, Padua, Venice - names that trickle off the tongue. Some more powerful states than others. Each had their own centre of learning and it is not surprising that the Republic contains more that 30 botanic gardens, the first being the 13^th century garden of herbs at the Vatican. Latin of course was the academic language of the world as we knew it and in fact is still not dead and wont lie down. Gardeners certainly know this.

Surfing the web there are overwhelming numbers of sites for the Renaissance gardens of Italy to visit. However I will argue that the joy of Italy can be missed if you take a limited approach.

When I visualise and remember what is so wonderful about the gardens and horticulture I remember the fruit trees of the north heavy with blossom, - remember their pears, cherries? fruit trees lining the roads mile on mile. Then the rolling wheat fields of Central Italy , the basis of pasta and the pizza, interspersed with heliotropes, the large sunflower used for oil. Also lets not forget the other key horticultural wonder – the olive industry. Go south to the lemon groves of the Amalfi coast. To see the tomato harvest of plum tomatoes travelling in overflowing lorry loads to the canning factory is gobsmacking eye wateringly astounding given the dirt poor nature of the very south.. The Italian tomato – the food of the people is now a global enterprise.

The North South divide – The link between the foods able to be grown, the climate of each area and the cultural habits that flow from these factors is sharply brought into focus here in Italy.

Ignoring the phenomenal coastline of the Republic which allows for everyday fishing.is mistaken as I guess it is a very good source of fertiliser - (a point I will check up on).

The real key to the states of Italy then is really its horticultural diversity which has managed to keep ordinary people eating and living relatively well despite its feudal history.

Agave Americana - fully grown now

Hard to work out its exact growth over the last six weeks, it is now huge and verdant for a short period. The birds will start to strip the seeds out now. It is over 20 feet anyway and is still about 17 inches around its girth.

Extraordinarily there are American Agaves this year where I have never seen even one before in the Rambla.

Recently driving down to a beach I had never visited in the Cabo de Gata I saw from a distance a series of masts - I thought it really did have a sailing facility... as I got closer of course it was a forest of agaves sailing on a sand dune.

In Praise of the Caper Plant

I am so struck with awe by this ancient plant, mentioned in the bible and the ancient greeks. The Caper plant (capparis spinosa (L) ) is native to the Mediterranean. I havent been able to discover how much further beyond this region it has been cultivated except in specialist and botanical gardens including the Eden Project ( http://www.edenproject.com/media/current-releases/april/eden-gardeners-and-their-cliff-top-capers.php)

Well here we are in the middle of caper season again and I am busy picking, pickling, utilising and admiring the different stages of this remarkable and useful plant.

Why?

• It goes through the most beautiful growth cycle (while being fortified by the most vicious of thorns)
  

• it grows in poor soil

• You have to do nothing to it - it just dies back and reappears the next year and will continue to do so for decades.

• it has enormous and famous culinary uses

• it is wild and it is free

• its medicinal uses are endless
  

All that aside I encourage any plants that spring up near the house by cutting and using at all stages but leaving some to gaze upon because of their beauty.

Medical Uses

antirheumatic, analgesic taken as herbal teas, bruised leaves used in a poultice for gout, reduces flatulence, aids liver function and many others

Culinary

The smallest bud is the most highly prized.
Its buds are pickled and used in salads, on pizzas, in pasta, its tips are pickled in brine as a vegetable and so are its swollen buds after the flowering is over.

Its most famous recipes probably in

• potato salad with capers - I use cooked and cooled, preferably small waxy, potatoes, a finely cut onion, high quality mayonnaise and pickled caper buds. If they are the bigger buds it is best to cut them more finely. Fold together gently and serve.
  

• Skate or where skate is overfished then ray with black butter and caper sauce. Best I ever had was in Jersey.

• Caper sauce - simply a white sauce with capers and some of the caper vinegar/brine it is pickled in. Can be used with mutton, herring or mackerel.

European names for the Caper

Dutch kappertjes
English caper, caperberry, caperbush
French câprier, câpres, fabagelle, tapana
German kapper, Kapernstrauch
Italian cappero
Norwegian kapers
Portuguese alcaparras
Russian kapersy
Spanish alcaparra, caparra
Swedish kapris

Agave Americana - at 40 days

This image is now hard to capture if you have been following its life and death as I have to stand further back. And more to come... We are guessing 18 -20 feet now.

Stunningly we have already had a roller come in for a good look around. ( A roller is a medium sized bird, very beautiful with turquoise and gold plumage. Shy and almost invariably has a partner close by. ) Couldn't get the camera set up in time but I will wait for the next time....

Who didnt win at Chelsea

Well, the Daily Telegraph Garden by Ulf not only won a gold but was voted best garden of the show. I think in the end it does catch the important elements of the way we are likely to be living within and without our gardens and nature in 2009 and 2010. Simple lines, deceptively simple colour palette.

It was quite interesting though how the cameras and discussions had a tendency to end up in what I think was a darling of a garden, the Foreign and Colonial Investments Garden designed by Thomas Hoblyn with its wooden wave and beautiful maiden. Guess they've got loadsamoney...Still I think in a way it was the unofficial best in show.

As predicted by the pundits the aquilegia was probably the most surprising star of the flower show. The photo left is another one of mine that has popped up in my Spanish cottage garden this summer.

There was more than an eye cocked at climate change and design. It is always hard to know if it was credit crunch or climate change that motivated some of the designs but from where I was sitting in my armchair in Spain I welcomed the use of water tolerant plants in such exciting ways.

Some big names weren't there. M and S for a very big one. But you could have knocked me down with a feather to see the Olive Tree Garden. These olive trees had been selected very carefully from the high northern areas of Spain so that they should already be hard for cold and wind. Well done that couple! They started with a big open field and look where they ended up.

On balance I just love the way that the show kept throwing up innovative ideas how to use or decorate or put together just about anything. The garden based on Robert Dudley's attempts to impress the first Queen Elizabeth, the perfumerie looked fun and was apparently interactive.

And who won a gold for their rose but I didnt get to see this on my tv? But nice write up at this RHS garden blog:

http://mygarden.rhs.org.uk/blogs/graham_rice/archive/2009/05/18/peter-beales-roses-new-at-chelsea-09.aspx

Well done Peter Beales!

I think I would have liked a bit more technology personally speaking. Selective editing is of course going to be a big issue but some hard work needs to be done to really go beyond the obvious imho..
Lights and water were in abundance - I would have liked to have known something about costs, mechanisms and so on for the real world. Its a bit like MPs in parliament - you dont really know about the hidden costs. Still the coverage had me glued to the old tv this week more than usual and the left hand side of the cortex was sparking with visual and creative ideas to keep me going for quite a while.

Agave Americana - at 24 days

- and still going.

Sweden and its gardens

It does not surprise me that I come to write of Sweden and its gardens through the cinema. Cinema has always been one of the highest art forms in Sweden and my photographic and cinematic enthusiasm is really whetted by the current Kenneth Branagh series of “Wallander” filmed around Inspektor Kurt Wallander's hometown Ystad in Sweden.

The director Philip Martin and the Cinematographer Anthony Dod Mantle (2009 Best Achievement “Slumdog Millionaire”) conferred to make sure they were going to be able to create a visual style that reflected Sweden – natural, simple, clean lines, an amalgum with the landscape, melancholic. This thread that permeates through all the Swedish arts can be found equally in garden design.

A recent strong example of this is the Linnaeus Garden which won a Gold Medal at the Chelsea Flower Show in 2007, designed Ulf Nordfjell with art works inspired by the work of Georg Dionysius Ehret and executed by Anna Karin Furunes. This garden is a miracle of white and silver simplicity inevitable water features. The garden is now reset out in Gothenburg Botanical Gardens. This botanical garden is considered to be the premier Swedish garden. See below

I note with interest that the Daily Telegraph contribution to the Chelsea Flower Show 2009 will be a garden designed by Ulf Nordfjell which will be a fusion of Anglo and Swedish elements. I look forward to what this will actually mean In gardening design.

Two Important Swedish Carls -

Carl Linnaeus (1707-78)

is known as the father of modern taxonomy who created the system for naming, ranking and classification of all organisms. He named about 7700 plant organisms and 4400 species of animals. Prior to his work any scientific name had no validity unless Linnaeus included it in his works. His most important work was published in 1753 and called “The Species of Plants”

Carl Larrsson (1853-1919)

Internationally beloved realist painter who shared his riotously colourful garden Lilla Hyttnas and family with the world through his art. Karin his wife was also trained artist and her bold ideas were a major plank in what we see and enjoy about the artist his home and and environment.

Other interesting Swedish garden pointers:

Swedish railway stations

Really was intrigued by the gardening around Swedish railway stations which were to actively encourage birds and bees.

Found in this reference http://www.nzetc.org/tm/scholarly/tei-Gov06_08Rail-t1-body-d5-d3.html which is dated 1932

“At every station, he reports, as well as every signalman's cottage, a garden is laid out at the expense of the State Railways, which also send out special gardening inspectors to advise. In addition, he states, the railway administration has taken wild birds under its protection by putting up no less than 12,000 feeding perches in the trees adjacent to the railway line “ British Rial take note...

Two important botanical gardens

Gothenburg Botanical Garden considered to be the premier Swedish Garden – it is also where the Linnaeus Garden was re-established having won a First at the Chelsea Flower Show in 2007.Garden. This is a link to the plants to be found in the Linnaeus Garden.

http://w3.goteborg.se/botaniska/PDF/VaxtlistaLinnetrdg.pdf

Fredriksdal Museum and Gardens themed on an 18^th century manor house thereby reflecting provincial life. Notable rose garden and kitchen gardening. (www.fredriksdal.se)

Nordic Gardens Fair at Alvsjo near Stockholm

Sweden has a number of formal gardens, as ever attached to houses and palaces of importance and more than a little influenced by the French tradition of formal gardens. A good example would be the Gronsoo Palace built 1611, west of Stockholm. Gustavian in style with a famous Lake Malaran and 720 hectares of landscape demonstrating farmlands, forestry and so forth.

Advent of RHS Chelsea Flower Show 2009

Can you believe it? We are ahead of the game on this blog. It is that major gardening event in UK right now and this is a quote from the Daily Telegraph's Bluffers Guide to CFS 2009.

"Chelsea looks backwards with quotes from Keats and Tennyson on the meaning of life, potent medicinal herbs used by beekeeping monks, an alchemist's den in the Fens and Queen Elizabeth 1's perfume, emphasising the continuing power of plants".

Other major events being pointed up are

.....the real interest in growing vegetables
.....vertical growing togive up more space and protection to the above
.....the continuing love of fine grasses and a new amour - the hornbeam espaliered and, my word, aquilegias (See left, my first one in my Spanish garden)

The rumour is that there isnt as much money around in this event this year. Well that is going to be a shock to the system as the British gardening industry is worth about $6 billion - that s a lot of cabbage....The clever blighters though will be showing the gardening public the money saving gardening tips, tools and water saving plants I am going to guess...

Reading up on 2008, I had a shock to find that Monty Don had a stroke while doing the 80 Gardens round the World programme. How had that passed me by? Well guess you wont be reading my blog Monty but sending you postive thoughts for a full recovery.

Also got a jolt as there is going to be a Swedish garden for the Daily Telegraph designed by Ulf Nordfjell. I better get my Swedish article up now!

www.rhs.org.uk/chelsea/tickets.asp

What constitutes a Garden?

Yesterday I rather foolishly took on a rather long “stroll” near Lorca to try to find the Menhir de Serrato, There is a sign post in Lorca saying it is 4.5kms away. Then I turn up a road that says 1.5kms to the Menhir. I drive over a kilometer more and find another sign. Logic would say it is about half maybe one kilometer further on up the track. Wrong. And it also turned out to be a bit of a scorcher and we left the water in the car..... and of course with creeping weakening muscles because of ms, and age. It took me ages to cover what should be I guess a 20 minute walk to the bowl edge. Yeah yeah yeah....

Well being stubborn I got there and was rewarded with a siting of a hardly known four meter high megalith sitting in a very deep bowl. An incredibly secretive place, absolutely quiet, scented with a rich variety of herbs and what came to mind was speech in Midsummer Night's Dream.” I know a place where the wild thyme blows.... “



The sense of a pagan garden or socially cohesive important place was very powerful. There were signs of small animal tracks and clearly these are what humans follow down to the stone.

Having slid most of the way down the bowl to the stone by grabbing handfuls of esparto grass we use what shade we can obtain by putting our backs to the north of the stone for some rest and contemplation before the climb out. There was a plaque that sid this stone had been found in 1975 would you believe, that the stone probably datedfrom about four or five thousand years ago. Then you start the why questions....

Inevitably the first place to start looking for answers is the computer but there is nothing in English I can find. And almost nothing in Spanish except for one good blog where people have walked in as a club at a more appropriate time of year – like February. A couple of references to the Lorca Museum of Archeology which I have already visited and seen some of the human artifacts found around the Menhir. This is when I look for definitions of the word “garden”. What happens is, the more I look the more I am pushed back in time. I come across the first references to neolithic gardens for heavens sake. I guess we have to take the beginning of horticulture as the beginning of gardens. Then I start to fall over links to all sorts of associations of myths pagan rites statuary and I mentally have to start to close down. No wonder there are now prehistorians who specialise now in gardens. Anyway I think I have made a good enough case here to put up some photos of this special place which feels like some very old socially cohesive garden with statuary.

My Garden and I - Spring 2009

Winter come to an end... out of the dormancy of the land the slow emergence of our garden becomes apparent. Our personal winter bird population had an absolute field day on the abundant crop of prickly pear fruit. Particularly noisy most mornings is the green woodpecker who sits atop the hedge of prickly pear spraying droplets of water from the fruit and leaves in the early morning sunlight. Spectacular photograph – if he would let me take it.... .Instead here is a barbed bouquet of prickly pears.

The structural work on the delapidated cottages finally has been taking place and these two old peasant homes are at least waterproof and beginning to take on a certain charm. The need to clear away from the walls in order to repair them meant cutting back through ivy and . This also changes the gardening dynamics. My gardener's brain and imagination has started taking off in unexpected areas.

The winter seems to have been long but without any real extremes at our height of 740 meters.. The almond trees' abundancy of flowers promises much and there have been no serious winds or frosts at our height to threaten the crop.

Five years ago these valleys were absolutely stricken by severe frost while the sap was rising and devastated many of the limited amount of trees in this semi arid region. It just shows that time and more fortunate weather can reap fabulous benefits on the landscape. It is our own nature for

neatness and tidiness which is really suspect. The landscape this spring is stunning and trees one thought had had it are draped with bridal veils of white, pink and a host of other variations according to almond type. At their feet there are swathes of early wild flowers – weeds to some.

I am spending money at the tree centre as this is when I have the opportunity to get a few more trees in. The ground is actually soft enough in which to dig large enough holes. Our tiny vegetable patch has a few beans planted and courgettes this year. There is this small window of opportunity to grow some things before the middle of summer fries everything in sight that is green. Last year was the learning curve on this....

We are also blessed by a wonderfully verdant supply of a wild spinach. Last year I was pulling it up as “weed” but in the last few weeks it has been our staple vegetable.

A little aside: Jason Webster the writer of Duende has a new book out on the creation of a garden up in the hills of the Castellon region on very ancient terraces. Listening as I do to "Excess Baggage" I heard him say that he has planted oaks with truffle spore. A really good money spinner except for one thing - the boars hve found them too.

Lots of discussion around as to how to stop the wild boar mashing one's garden. Pee ing , human hair hung from fences - anyone want to add to the list?

The Agave Americana April 2009 - Part Four

Ten days growth ...

Two weeks now...

Trying to measure the diameter without loss of life and limb....



...at this point diameter is 17 inches (41cms)

The strength of this part of the stem is phenomenal as well - used for structural posts by us in rebuilding the old cottage