‘I
think this is my last season on the plot’ says Robin.
He looks
genuinely concerned. He sits perched opposite my bench and is looking at me and
ignoring Lottie who is fast asleep next to me.
‘Have
we upset you? Done something to offend you? Has someone promised you more grubs
and feeding sessions?’ I ask not wishing to lose my red breasted feathered companion.
‘No,
it’s not you or Lottie, but I have been reading what the ‘Birdman’ wrote about
Climate change on the allotments’ replies Robin.
‘Climate
change? Why will that affect you?’ I ask wondering what our friend and
committee member Chris has written that has filled Robin’s tiny head with
concern. Chris is referred to affectionately by our feathered friends as the ‘Birdman’
because he religiously feeds half the birds in Docklands. The ring-necked parakeets
even fly North over the river just to eat at his bird table! I think they have
awarded him a 5-star rating.
I
look at Lottie, but she is either pretending to be asleep and guilty or just
unconcerned and dreaming of chasing squirrels.
“Where
will you go?’ I ask.
‘West,
away from London and the South East. He says here it’s going to be like
Barcelona and the swifts and swallows have told me all about the heat and dry
conditions there and frankly it’s not for me. It’s bad enough not knowing from
one month to the next what the weather is going to be like, but Barcelona I don’t
want.’ Robin’s concerned face has turned to one which looks firm and
determined. ‘You know I am known all over as the Christmas bird and have my
photo taken in the snow for those cards and calendars.’
‘What
snow?’ I reply with my tongue firmly against my cheek.
‘Exactly!’
Robin says with a firm nod of the head.
I
remind myself about Chris’s article and the genuine concerns he expressed about
what he called Climate Chaos, human induced change, where the seasons and
weather had become less predictable and increasing extremes of weather often depended
on where you live. London and the South East was becoming progressively hotter
and drier than the rest of the UK and the impact that has on what, when and how
you grow produce on the plot. Did we now have all year-round growing seasons
where the milder ‘winter’ enables us to still produce much of what we would
have not thought possible a few decades ago albeit more slowly?
Your
gardening calendar is often established where and when you start to garden.
Mine was in Sheffield and in an area that experienced clear seasons and conformed
with those sowing and growing charts. I then moved to Aberdeen which was very
different and had one very short but productive season but a weird summer phenomena
called the ‘har’ where sea mist would often envelop the coastal area for much
of the day but the nights were very short. Then in Hampshire a more normal garden
calendar but with mild winters. London is very different again and because the
allotments are in the heart of the City where the winters are very mild and I
rarely get a frost and you could describe the seasons as Early Spring, Late
Spring , Summer, Late summer, Autumn and a very short Winter.
Succession sowing, growing, and harvesting is possible,
but it has to be thought through a lot more than in the wetter West, the colder
North or even the more exposed rural areas. When folk say, ‘Is it too late to
sow, or too early to put out?’ I find myself wishing it was that simple and just
the same as those gardening calendars and bibles we want to follow. When the
magazines tell you what jobs need doing this month or Monty Don tells you jobs
to do this weekend, are they seriously saying we are all the same? I often sow
later and harvest sooner and any mistakes can soon be rectified whereas some areas
have one shot. I can sow some vegetables late and they will grow slowly all
winter and can be picked throughout the winter. I find that plants which would
require protection or bringing indoors over the cold, damp and frosty winter
can survive outdoors.
Mediterranean
plants like Geraniums happily survive winter as they do in the natural habitat.
The only killer is snow and that is so rare in London and when it does, it’s a
few flakes and gone as fast as it came. This again changes what and how you
grow. My neighbours’ Kiwi plant has been laden with flowers this year and hopefully
fruit later and sits on top of a bank and over an arbour and has no protection over
winter.
Chris
says he has a new second spring in September when he is busy planting all his
winter veg: onions, garlic, spinach, chard, winter lettuce, rocket, lambs
lettuce, winter radish, land cress, pak choi and other oriental winter veg. And
this is also the beginning of the season for him to start picking the earlier
planted leeks, beetroot, turnip, daikon, kale, chard etc. In late winter
and early Spring, he has wonderful crops of early veg at a time when most
gardeners are barely sowing seeds, let alone picking harvests.
At
our allotment we have a large local Chinese and Vietnamese community who grow
crops all year round, covering their rows of vegetables in rows of small ‘tunnels’.
This market garden style is very productive, and the produce grown can be very
exotic but demonstrates how they have adapted their skills and knowledge to the
new environment.
Our site is also surrounded
semi wild urban farmland which itself supports a huge biodiversity often
missing in urban areas. However, ensuring the land keeps giving and can produce
for longer and variable seasons is both an educational and practical challenge.
Soil must be enriched, and the nutrients taken out put back. Its balance of life
it supports must be maintained and maybe we must live with some foes to do
this. You cannot work the same piece of land year after year, season after
season without replenishing what has been taken out. It was the Agricultural
Revolution of the 18th century which introduced the move in crop rotation, the
principles of which we all follow today on our plots. But perhaps the current
Climate Chaos is making us rethink and adapt this to the new environment we
find ourselves growing in.
‘So when are you
leaving did you say?’ I ask Robin.
‘Not sure, maybe I’ll
stay a bit longer but I will need a supply of sun cream and sunglasses and some
new photos without the snow’ Robin replies as he hops down to examine a patch
of soil for his lunch.
We all must learn, adapt
and adopt to what is clearly a changing growing ecosystem.
I am indebted to Chris Parrish for his article ‘Urban
Gardening in the Anthropocene’
