“Gardens are fashioned for many purposes with many different tools, but all are collaborations with natural forces. Rarely do their makers claim to be restoring or rebuilding anything from the past; and they are never in full control of the results. Instead, using the best tools they have and all the knowledge that they can gather, they work to create future environments.
If there is a lesson it is that to think like the original inhabitants of these lands we should not set our sights on rebuilding an environment from the past but concentrate on shaping a world to live in for the future.”

–Charles C. Mann (1491: New Revelations of the Americas before Columbus)

Many years ago, I wrote this quote into a sticky note on my laptop. I look at it regularly, and it resonates with me every time. It expresses a mindset my husband and I employ on our little plot of land.

As I sit here on the porch on a warm summer afternoon, I can’t help but think back to what this section was like when we bought it—a bare paddock so devoid of nutrients that even the weeds were sparse. Sitting here today, I am surrounded by a mix of food crops, beautiful flowers and native plants. Five years ago, this plot of land could barely sustain the scraggliest of grass. Today it feeds us, provides food and shelter for native insects and birds, and is a welcome escape from all the ills of modern life. In time, as plants grow, it will hopefully become more sheltered, more resilient to temperature and rainfall extremes. In time, it will hopefully take less effort to maintain. In time, perhaps we will see native bellbirds and tūī as often as we see non-native blackbirds and starlings in the garden.

This is what we aim for. But, as Mann said, we’re not in full control. 

Native skinks seem to have disappeared from the garden, despite the abundant food and shelter we’ve provided. Perhaps the influx of domestic cats is at fault. Or maybe some other factor outside of our control. Unwanted weeds continue to invade from neighbouring properties. Plant diseases take advantage of favourable conditions to decimate crops from time to time. Hail, floods, droughts, and wind all take their toll. 

So the resulting garden is a compromise. What can we reasonably grow this year? What needs to be abandoned, either temporarily or permanently? What new opportunities are presented by quirks of nature or chance?

Guiding every decision is the question, what do we want the place to look like next year? In five years? Because, as Mann said, we’re shaping a world to live in for the future.

Incidentally …

If you haven’t read 1491, do it. It will shatter all those Eurocentric views of the world you’ve been steeped in since birth and change your whole attitude towards the history of the Americas.