roof garden

Last weekend I visited another garden open under the National Gardens Scheme - gardens open for charity. This is the roof garden at risc (Reading International Solidarity Centre).

This garden is just 200 square metres and is on the top of building right in the centre of the town. Walking up the iron staircase to the building we left the town behind and found ourselves in a very peaceful and green space. The garden planting was completed in 2002 and I was surprised by how mature the garden looked, the plants obviously thrive in their elevated location.

All the plants are growing in just twelve inches of soil.  There are over 200 hundred different species including several large trees far taller than me.  The garden was cleverly laid out with paths snaking back and forth making it feel much bigger.

roof  lights in the garden let natural light into the building below

The garden was designed as a forest garden, based on a natural woodland ecosystem, with different layers of planting from trees, through bushes and shrubs and smaller plants at ground level. There were also climbers planted against the railings so no space was wasted.  All the plants grown have uses such as food, medicine, scent, natural dyes.

The green roof provides insulation for the building keeping it warmer in winter and cooler in summer and also acts as a giant sponge absorbing rainwater and reducing runoff, an important feature in towns which have mostly impermeable surfaces leading to flash floods when the rain water cannot drain away. This intensively planted roof can absorb up to 80% of the rain that falls on it.

Although this roof garden is very different from normal domestic gardens, the principles of the planting can be applied to any garden and I came away with lots of ideas to try at home. Now I no longer have an allotment I am growing a few vegetables at home in amongst the existing flowers and shrubs, this garden showed me how much can be squeezed into a small plot.

A Farm for the Future

I watched A Farm for the Future last night (part of the BBC Natural World series) which looked at UK agriculture and its dependence on fossil fuels. Although there wasn't much new information it was a very good summary of the problems that we will face as the supply of oil runs out.

One thing I hadn't realised was the damage done to soil by ploughing year after year. Although land has been ploughed for thousands of years the damage has only occurred on a large scale as mechanisation has increased, more efficient ploughing means more efficient destruction of the soil wildlife and bacteria as the soil is turned and exposed to light and air. I was struck by a film of a tractor ploughing around thirty years ago when it was followed by flocks of birds picking up worms and insects and another film of ploughing taking place today, no birds follow the tractors now because there is so little life in the soil.  I remember seeing seagulls following tractors when I was small, but I hadn't really noticed that it didn't happen any more.  How sad, and bad news for food production too.

I was thinking about the program when I was out for a walk this afternoon, lots of the fields were freshly ploughed.

The program was not all doom and gloom though and there were some good examples of working with nature instead of against it such as very productive forest gardens producing huge crops from a small space. It makes me want to cram even more into my small garden.