“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.
This year was something of a milestone—it was the first year in about 16 that we didn’t do a pre-Christmas backpacking trip with the kids. It was bound to happen sometime soon, since the kids are all grown up now and doing their own things.
Instead, my husband and I had a post-Christmas hike all on our own. Let me say right now that I loved tramping with the kids, but doing the Christmas hike with just my husband was REALLY nice—just like old times … except that we’re a lot older. It was nice hiking at 54-year-old pace (instead of being dragged along by impatient 20-something kids), and we could also go places that appealed to us, without considering if the kids would enjoy it.
So we stayed relatively close to home, but took a route we hadn’t ever explored.
Day one began with dropping a car at the far end of our hike, near Kelly Creek. There was a bit of faffing around to charge the electric car (with the charger in Arthur’s Pass out of order, and the one in Otira busy), but it gave us an excuse to have a coffee at the Otira Hotel, which is an experience of its own.
Then we drove back to the Waimakariri River, parked car number two at Klondyke Corner, and hiked up the Waimakariri to Carrington Hut.
This hike is a bit of a slog and involves crossing the river a couple of times. In fact, the first river crossing comes within the first five minutes of hiking, which was fine—we were going to spend four and a half days walking rivers. There was no way we were going to have dry feet.
In spite of the dull nature of the actual hiking up to Carrington Hut, the scenery is fabulous, and only improves as you go further up the watershed. We were lucky to have a tern hunting the river alongside of us for a while, and we scared up a pair of banded dotterels, too.
After passing Anti Crow Hut, we left the riverbed to follow a track over a couple of roche moutonnée—rocky mounds left behind by glaciation. A series of tarns on the mounds give them a magical sort of quality, and the short break from river walking is nice.
The last time we were at Carrington Hut, it was incredibly crowded and unpleasant, so we carried a tent this time, just in case. But the 36-bunk hut housed only five of us that night, and we barely saw one another.
Day 2, we hiked over Harman Pass—up the Taipoiti River (click here for a video), then down Mary Creek. Again, the first act of the day was crossing a river, and then it was river crossings all day, back and forth across the Taipoiti as it rushed through a narrow valley which at times could be more properly called a gorge. It was another fabulous day, weather-wise, and the scenery was spectacular. So were the alpine plants. It seemed like EVERYTHING was in flower, and it was a slow hike up to the pass, because we were photographing all the way.
At the pass, we took a little jaunt up to see some tarns higher up, and then hung out for a while with a curious kea (click here for a video). Kea are an odd mix of highly endangered (there are 1,000-5,000 of them left), and incredibly pesky, thanks to their intelligence, curiosity and a beak shaped like a giant can opener (their peskiness is unfortunately part of the reason they’re endangered). The world’s only alpine parrot, it’s common to encounter them at elevation near Arthur’s Pass, but it never gets old.
Mary Creek was more of the same—river crossings, beautiful scenery, endangered birds. We spent some time watching a pair of whio (blue ducks) having a nap on a rock in the middle of the stream. There are only 3000 whio left and unfortunately the population is skewed strongly to males, because females are vulnerable to introduced predators when sitting on the nest. We were lucky enough to encounter two pairs on our trip.
After a 3-wire bridge crossing at the bottom of Mary Creek, we arrived at Julia Hut. The hut is relatively small, and with another couple there already, we decided to tent. After setting up the tent and settling in, we had the rest of the sunny afternoon to explore. A natural hot spring was our destination. Only five minutes walk from the hut, next to the icy, swiftly flowing Julia Creek (click here for a video), the hot pool did not disappoint. It was initially too hot to sit in, and we had to redirect some river water into it to temper the heat.
After a sweaty hike, I have to say I wasn’t all that interested in sitting in a hot pool, but I took a dunk in the river first, and then the hot pool was pretty nice. You couldn’t fault the setting—two days hike from a road, on an absolutely stunning mountain stream in the bush. It beat Hanmer Springs by a mile!
There is clearly a lot of geothermal activity in the area—the smell of sulphur was prevalent all along Julia Creek—and I suspect if you fossicked around, you’d find more hot pools.
Day 3 was a lot of river walking (again), punctuated by a couple more three-wire bridges. We hiked down Julia Creek and the Taipo River to Dillon Hut. Well, we intended to stay at Dillon Hut, but when we arrived we were informed by a very cute four-year-old that there were ‘no more mattresses’ (Dillon hut is only a 2-hour hike from the road, and is clearly a great destination for a short family hike). So we moved on to Dillon Homestead Hut, just 500 metres down the track.
Dillon Homestead Hut is just that—an old homestead. Built of hand-hewn timber and clad in whatever the original owners could scrounge, it is quite the historical experience to spend the night there. It’s clearly beloved by local four-wheel drivers and dirt bikers, but is in sore need of some upkeep. Still, it was shelter when the skies opened up and dumped rain all night, and if it had been cold, there was a big open fireplace surrounded by three tatty, 1950s-era armchairs. And once you brushed the rat droppings off the sleeping platforms, tables and chairs, it had everything you needed to spend the night.
Fortunately the rats weren’t as active inside the hut as I had feared, and we spent a reasonably comfortable night (if a bit smelly) in the hut. In the morning, however, I trudged out to the long drop through soaking wet, waist-high grass. The loo is as old as the hut, and was stocked with three mouldy, rat-poo-festooned rolls of toilet paper. I didn’t stop to investigate the myriad spider webs (there may have been some interesting native spiders), but in retrospect I should have inspected my surroundings a bit more. Leaving the door open for light and ventilation, I dropped my pants to do my business.
A scuttling overhead was all the warning I got before a rat leapt out of the rafters and landed on my head. I may have sworn. But the four-letter word had barely left my lips before the rat was off again, leaping for the toilet seat and then the floor before racing off into the bush.
So, a warning to you—the Dillon Homestead Hut loo is guarded by an attack rat.
After that exciting start, the rest of Day four was a hard climb. From Dillon Homestead Hut, we followed Seven Mile Creek briefly to a track that climbs steeply through dense west coast forest up to the Kelly Range. It was dark and humid in the forest. At one point, the track passed through a narrow gorge that was almost tunnel-like. It felt like we were crawling uphill, and often it was literally true, as it took both hands and feet. Pīwakawaka kept flitting around us, taunting us with their darting flight and chittering voices—what was so difficult about this slope, they seemed to ask.
At one point, the track met a huge slip hundreds of metres across and hundreds of metres tall. A blaze remained on a lone tree suspended at the top of the slip. The rerouted track scrambled precariously around the top of the slip, and I breathed easier once we were past it.
After 700 metres of elevation gain, we reached tree line and got a view back down to where we’d come from that morning—it was a long way down, and we still had more climbing to do.
The tops were dotted with tarns, and even where there wasn’t standing water, it was wet. We walked through fields of sundew plants, and took our breaks amid alpine orchids and daisies.
Clouds prevented us from having great views, but turned the views we did have into a dramatic, ever-changing landscape. By the time we’d reached the top of our climb—a thousand metres above Dillon Homestead Hut—the clouds were swirling around us.
A relatively short descent brought us to Caroll Hut just as the first raindrops began to fall. We had a late lunch of soup and peanut butter crackers as the wind picked up and the rain lashed the hut.
We shared Caroll Hut with a UK expat who lives in Wellington, a pair from Whanganui, and a fellow from Adelaide. It was a great mix, and we had a nice afternoon and evening chatting with them all. The best of hut life.
All night the wind howled, and I was thankful for the steel cables tethering the hut in place. Although the rain ended before dark, the wind continued through to morning, so it was a cold and windy start to Day 5. An early morning treat at the hut was a family of weka with fluffy chicks fossicking around the hut.
Day 5 was a short (hour and a half) jaunt out to the road from Caroll Hut. The ‘jaunt’ involved a good 800 metre elevation change, steeply downhill, but not bad going, with some nice views from time to time. And just when we thought we were done with wet boots, there was a stream crossing in the last 20 metres.
We were home by lunchtime, wet and tired, but having had an excellent five days. It was a fabulous way to spend the Christmas-New Year gap.
At this time of year, I love chatting with others about their holiday traditions. Every family’s traditions are unique—a combination of family history, ancestry, and geography all mashed together with individual preferences.
Trifle has mostly replaced cookies as my Christmas baking of choice.
And they evolve over time. The Christmas traditions I grew up with are not the ones I practise today. They took a dramatic shift twenty years ago when we moved to New Zealand from Minnesota—northern hemisphere traditions make no seasonal sense here, where Christmas and the summer school holidays coincide.
So my husband and I adapted. Like most Kiwis, our holidays involve travel—we have a tradition of a family backpacking trip the week before Christmas. I always carry a little stuffed reindeer, strapped to the top of my pack, as our holiday hike mascot. We pack Christmas cookies, and usually include one ‘fancy’ camp meal (especially if the tramp extends over Christmas Day).
Our Christmas tree isn’t a pine tree—a cut tree would last about three minutes in the summer heat and wind. Instead, we make our ‘tree’ each year out of whatever materials we have on hand. Making, then decorating the tree is usually a whole-family event.
The LEGO tree of 2019 was one of my favourites, with a motor powering moving parts.
Our big Christmas meal (if we’re not on the trail) is on Christmas Eve—calzones full of vegetables from the garden. We make extras, and enjoy the leftovers for lunch on Christmas Day.
The big day is meant to be a day of relaxation for everyone, so Christmas breakfast sticky buns are made the night before, and rise in the fridge overnight, to be popped into the oven in the morning. After a lunch of leftover calzones, dinner is a big salad accompanied by cheese and bread. Simple as. No slaving in the kitchen on a beautiful summer day.
Boxing Day is beach day for us—along with most of the population of New Zealand—a day to relax with the family and celebrate summertime.
It’s a long way from the hot cocoa, turkey dinners, and carolling of Christmases in my youth, but our traditions do what all good holiday traditions do—they provide opportunities to spend time with family while enjoying seasonal delights.
So happy holidays to you all, and may you enjoy your own traditions, whatever they are! Add a comment with your own traditions!
I’m part of a local group of keen vegetable gardeners who meet fortnightly throughout the growing season. Each meetup involves a tour around someone’s garden, and then a cup of tea, while we discuss our gardens and gardening, complain about the weather, and generally catch up with each other.
Our most recent gathering was at a garden just 200 metres down the road from our house. Bev’s been gardening there for over 20 years, and the property is beautifully sheltered by large hedges and mature plantings.
And even though we live only a three minute walk away from one another, our gardens grow remarkably differently.
Bev’s is almost always a week or two ahead of mine. And not just because she plants earlier than I do—her tree and berry crops leaf out, bloom and fruit before mine do. She plants out her tomatoes before I do, her carrots germinate more rapidly and grow more quickly, her peas outstrip mine within weeks of germination, her green beans produce pods a week ahead of mine. The differences are remarkable.
We are so close to one another, the temperature and rainfall on our two gardens is all but identical. But Bev has created an amazing microclimate for her plants with rich soil and excellent shelter.
Other women in the group have done similar wonders on their properties, creating striking pockets of abundance by carefully manipulating the microclimate in their gardens. In fact, my garden is sometimes behind other group members’ gardens in colder locations.
It’s something to aspire to. Having started with a bare paddock with no topsoil four and a half years ago, we’ve come a long way on our property, but we also have a long way to go. We are incredibly fortunate to have amazing gardeners nearby to inspire us to keep working towards our own pocket of abundance.
The natural microclimate of our property is apparently perfect for dandelions, because they are abundant and healthy everywhere.We haven’t managed a good microclimate for citrus yet, except in the greenhouse.We do manage to grow great broad beans!
It’s always exciting when we cross over onto the light side of the equinox. The whole garden responds to the rapidly lengthening days. Daffodils and tulips run riot. Pale fingers of asparagus poke up through the mulch. Artichokes spring up from winter-lush plants. Perennial herbs suddenly flush green with new growth. Fruit trees turn snowy with blossoms. Vegetable seedlings seem to double in size overnight.
The weeds, too, spring up overnight. And the rats and devouring sparrows multiply. Aphid populations explode. Spring isn’t all fun and games.
Fortunately, the gardener responds, too. I wake with the magpies warbling as the sky begins to shade from black to grey. I spend more of my weekend hours in the garden. I snatch a few minutes to water or weed before and after work. On my writing days, my lunchtime walk is replaced by lunchtime gardening. Daily life begins to mould around the sun and the plants that respond to it.
It is exciting, and it can be daunting to look forward to all the work that the new growing season entails—the planting, weeding, watering, harvesting, processing …
But it’s important to simply sit and enjoy. Our garden is four years old this year, and this spring I feel as if it is coming into its own. My husband recently built trellises for espaliered apple trees, and with the planting of those trees, the gardens in the front are finally ‘finished’. Not that there isn’t lots of work to do out there, but all the pieces of the plan for that space are in place.
In the vegetable garden, too, the final piece—the garden shed—is enjoying its first spring of use (and what a joy to work in there, potting up tomatoes or planting seeds!). After the application of, literally, tonnes of manure and compost over the last four years, the garden soil promises reasonable productivity, and we can count on plenty of fruit and vegetables in the coming months.
I find myself spending more time enjoying the garden this spring than I remember doing anytime recently. What better excuse for a cup of tea on the porch than that the daffodils are spectacular, or the bees are humming in the rosemary blossoms?
So here’s a bit of my spring garden for you. Hope you enjoy it as much as I do!
We’re two days away from the official start of spring here in Aotearoa New Zealand, and the atmosphere is definitely vernal.
The daffodils are up, and I expect them to be in full bloom within a week. The tulips are following close behind them.
Artichoke buds are beginning to form, nestled among winter’s leafy growth, ready to shoot up and deliver gourmet meals for the coming three months, and the fruit trees and berry bushes are flowering and leafing out, despite the fact there are frosts to come.
In the tunnel house and cold frame, vegetable seedlings bask in the sun. The first ones will be ready for planting out this weekend. In the warmth of the living room indoors, seeds germinate by a sunny window. They, too, will end up in the tunnel house and cold frame before long.
The bumble bees and honey bees are blundering around in dandelion blossoms, the ladybugs are out and about, and I’m keeping an eye on a preying mantis egg case which should hatch before too long.
The sounds have become spring-like as well—frogs trilling at night, magpies warbling before dawn, and white-faced herons croaking in the treetops.
Along with the bucolic scenes of flowers and bumble bees, spring in Canterbury brings howling wind. The wind whips up clouds of pine and wattle tree pollen, which settles like gritty mustard powder on every surface. The windows are hazy with it, and I find myself swiping my computer screen clear several times a day.
The wind makes springtime a challenging season—blossoms blown off the trees; fresh growth flattened to the ground; trees (and the occasional camper van or centre pivot irrigator) tipped over; trampolines, greenhouse panels and rubbish bins flying free … A lot of people struggle with springtime wind here. And of course, there will be more frost. There may even be snow yet to come. Plants out in the cold frame will have to be hauled back into the house and out again several times, tender plants will have to be covered with frost cloth. Invariably it will be too hot and dry for the early crops one week, then too cold and wet for the late crops the following week. There will be multiple disasters in the garden due to weather, pests, irrigation malfunction, or any number of other factors. I’ll struggle and I’ll stress …
Moody springtime sky, with rain obscuring the mountains.
But there will be moments when the wind stills, the sun is warm, and I can sit among the spring blossoms drinking a cup of tea and watching the bees and dreaming of summer.
Last weekend was quite warm—temperatures in the mid to upper teens—with sunshine to make me think of spring. It was a gift I didn’t want to waste.
A tidy herb garden. The wooden step had been nearly overgrown by the thymes on either side.
Most years, we have a window of beautiful weather in the depths of winter. It’s a great time to get out and do some tidying in the garden.
So last weekend, I deadheaded and trimmed the herbs and flowers. I had mostly kept up with the deadheading through the autumn, but I trimmed sparingly then, trying to coax a few more blooms out of bedraggled plants. Last weekend, I was ruthless. With fresh new growth just beginning to show, I cut away all of last year’s rangy branches, even if they managed to make it through most of winter with a few leaves intact.
The thyme, finally mostly done blooming, got a major haircut. I reclaimed paths from great swathes of creeping thyme and from bushy thymes muscling out over the edges of their beds. I cut the mint and oregano to the ground to encourage nice lush cushions of leaves in spring. I cut off dense clumps of dead flower spikes from the winter savoury, and hacked a rangy sage back to try to improve its look. I hauled four wheelbarrow loads of dead leaves and flowers and trimmed herbs out of the front gardens.
I actually rescued this path two weeks ago. The wet area shows where the creeping thyme was cut away. Other paths were equally invaded.
Then I turned my sights to the basket willow. It never fully loses its leaves here, but at some point in the winter, it needs to be cut to the ground. I harvested four hefty bundles of long sticks from it. I’ll use those sticks in the garden over the coming year to support plants, frost cloth and bird netting. Once the trees were levelled, it was time to tackle the thick layer of leaves they’d strewn over the path and the stones of the Zen garden. I raked them up and tucked them underneath other plants as mulch.
After the plant tidy-up, there was the garden shed to tackle. In two weeks, I’ll start using the shed weekly for starting seeds and potting up seedlings. It needs to be clean and tidy for that. So I sorted through all the stuff that had carelessly been tossed in there over the past couple of months—sacks of bird netting and potting mix, plant trays, irrigation hoses … everything that came out of the garden at the end of summer and had never been properly put away.
My husband finished a beautiful rack on the back of the shed on Sunday, so the tidying expanded to include going through the pile of wood sitting in the orchard, and organising everything worth saving onto the new rack. Some of the things weren’t worth ‘saving’, but were worth using right away, leading to a new bench in the fern garden that I’m looking forward to sitting on with a cup of tea some day soon.
And of course, while I was at it, it was time to tidy the pile of fencing, hoops and stakes I use in the vegetable garden every summer. These items sit atop a wooden platform beside the compost pile. I hauled everything off the platform and realised the rats had shoved compost under it, nearly filling the space.
So, the platform had to be lifted, and I hauled almost two full wheelbarrow loads of beautiful compost out from underneath and spread it on the garden.
By Sunday afternoon, a walk through the yard was a delight, with everything neat and tidy. I had lunch on the porch, gazing out into an immaculate herb garden. I hadn’t considered it messy before, but the difference was stunning. The Zen garden, visible now that the willows are down, is a little gift every time I step outside. And I can’t wait to start seeds in the tidy garden shed.
Unfortunately, there will be no sitting outside to enjoy the garden this week. The clouds rolled in Monday morning, and by the time we got home from work, the rain had begun. It promises to be a proper winter storm, with wind, rain and temperatures in the single digits. (The snow won’t reach us here, but the mountains should be spectacular when the clouds clear.) I’ll have to enjoy the garden from indoors this week.
I enjoy winter hiking—I enjoy the crisp air, the opportunity to hike without sweating too much, the snow on the peaks.
One of my favourite winter phenomena is frost heave. This is when moisture in the soil freezes. Since water expands when it freezes, the ice crystals push soil and rocks upward. We get frost heave at home, but in the mountains, where there is both more water and colder temperatures, the phenomenon can be spectacular.
On a cold Matariki morning a few weeks ago, I snapped a photo of five-centimetre-long ice needles near Foggy Peak. Each needle was topped by gravel—the whole top centimetre or more of the sloping surface lifted. As the sun rose and melted the ice, every rock fell a few centimetres downhill from where it started. I imagine this process happening daily all through winter—a slow-motion conveyor belt shifting the mountain downhill.
Meanwhile, higher up on the mountain, water seeping into the cracks in rocks and then freezing shatters them day by day into smaller fragments to be added to the icy conveyor belt.
It is such a small thing, frost heave. But its slow action has a big effect.
The Southern Alps are rising at a rate of 10 to 20 millimetres per year—some of the fastest rising mountains in the world. If no erosion had ever occurred, the mountains would currently stand over 20 kilometres tall. Our tallest mountain, Aoraki Mount Cook, is 3754 metres tall.
Of course, when we think of erosion, we think of the big events like landslides and rock avalanches. These events can be spectacular.
On 14 December 1991, a rock avalanche on Aoraki lowered the summit by 10 metres over the course of a few hours. Fourteen million cubic metres of rock and ice tumbled down the mountain at speeds of up to 300 kilometres per hour. The shock waves from the landslide were recorded on seismographs as far as 58 kilometres away.
But without frost heave, the 1991 Aoraki rock avalanche might never have happened. Frost heave slowly weakened the rocks, slowly snapped them into smaller and smaller pieces, slowly shifted their weight. Centimetre by centimetre, those little ice needles brought the mountainside down.
I like to think of frost heave as a metaphor. Each of those tiny ice crystals, by itself, can move a pebble, and together they bring down mountains.
Today is Matariki, and like new year celebrations all around the world, it’s a day for assessing the past and planning the future. It’s a day to spend with family and friends. It’s a day to remember and honour our connections with other people, the seasons, and the land.
Spending time with whānau wasn’t an option for me today, so I thought I’d celebrate my connections to the seasons and the Earth instead. Before dawn I drove to Porter’s Pass and hiked up towards Foggy Peak. It was dark when I began the ascent, with just a hint of light to the east. I hiked the first 40 minutes or so with my head torch, before it was light enough to see the track.
Being midwinter, I expected it to be cold. It was actually surprisingly warm to start—the air temperature was above freezing. But the wind was stiff, and the temperature was still falling. Thankfully, there was no problem staying warm on the uphill.
But the wind grew more fierce the further up I went. I stopped frequently to enjoy the beauty of dawn in the mountains, to gaze back at the bright smudges of towns dotting the plains, the pinpricks of light from the cars crawling up the mountain to Porters Pass. I never stopped for long, though.
I’d hoped to catch the sunrise from the summit of Foggy Peak, but as the scree gave way to icy snow, my progress slowed, and I wished for crampons. I watched sun strike the snowy peaks of the Craigieburn Range and decided that that would have to be good enough—I could push on to Foggy Peak, but I wasn’t going to sit there with a cup of tea and watch the sun rise as I’d hoped. Even if I’d been in time, it was too windy and cold.
So I had my tea in a sheltered spot lower down, where I could sit and enjoy the view. It wasn’t the summit, but it was a beautiful way to start the new year.
As my regular readers all know, I spend a lot of time in the garden. I also spend a lot of time thinking about gardens, looking at gardens, planning gardens …
The bare paddock: former forest, future garden
I am fortunate to be part of a local group of keen vegetable gardeners. Of course, we don’t just grow vegetables—everyone has perennial food crops like fruit trees and berry bushes, and ornamental plants as well. All of us take pleasure in planting and maintaining our gardens, as well as relaxing in and enjoying them. Some of us are in the early stages of establishing our gardens, and others have spent decades cultivating one place. But we’re all focused on the future.
I’m reminded of the quote I copied years ago from the book 1491: New Revelations of the Americas before Columbus, by Charles C. Mann:
“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.”
I look at the 3000 square metres of land my husband and I own. For thousands of years, this land was covered in forest and periodically scoured by the Waimakariri River, which deposited around 300 metres of rock and clay here on top of the bedrock. When Māori arrived in the region, they burnt the forest to flush out moa and other game birds. European settlers later brought in sheep and cows and planted European pasture grasses. From the mid 1800s to 2019, our little block of land was used to pasture sheep, and later, dairy cows. When it was subdivided to develop as residential housing, the topsoil was scraped off, leaving bare, highly compacted clay studded with rocks. Even weeds grew poorly (in places where we have done nothing to improve the soil, there are still bare patches, where nothing has been able to grow in the past 5 years).
Flaxes provide food for native birds, currents provide food for us.
There was no restoring or remaking what was once here, but when we bought the land, we envisioned a place rich in native plants that might attract native lizards, birds and insects. We envisioned a place full of plants that would provide food—an orchard, berry crops, nuts, herbs and vegetables. We envisioned a place that was beautiful, and bright with flowers.
A volunteer lancewood.
We cannot erase the fact that the soil here has been sorely abused for nearly two hundred years. We can’t erase the fact that we sit over an old river bed full of rock and clay. Not everything we plant flourishes, and other plants have done so well, they’ve become weeds. Some insects and birds have returned, but glaring absences remain, and non-native pests still dominate.
But like all gardeners, we look to the future, our imaginations filling the gaps in what we see today. We do our best to collaborate with the natural forces at work here in order to shape a little pocket of plenty for ourselves and others.
Robinne Weiss 