garden

Cool Cities Have Botanical Gardens

- Adam Clare Leave a comment

If you live near a park you know that even a small amount of nature can cool the local environment, and you know that the bigger the park the more cool it is. In terms of a land-to-cooling-effect ratio certain types of parks are more efficient than others with the clear winner being a botanical garden. A simple playground with some trees can cool the local area by 2.9 degrees, a green roof can cool areas by 4.1 degrees, botanical gardens reduce outdoor temperature by 4.9 degrees! Any natural spaces can cool your neighbourhood so this summer get out there, plant some plants, and make your city a cooler place.

From a pool of more than 27,000 research papers, the researchers selected 202 for meta-analysis based on a number of urban green-blue-grey infrastructure categories – including parks, engineered greening projects, wetlands, green walls, parks and botanical gardens.

Trees and plants, for example, help reduce heat by reducing the amount of direct sunlight reaching the ground, while also releasing moisture into the air. Water bodies cool the surrounding environment via “evapotranspiration, shading, the albedo effect, groundwater recharge and temperature buffering” and could also serve as heatsinks, cooling during daylight hours and offering warming potential at night. Green roofs and walls not only help insulate buildings, but also reduce heat absorption, and vegetation can serve as windbreaks for natural ventilation.

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Start a Small Garden This Spring

- Adam Clare

Anyone can be a gardener and you can too! All you need is a balcony or small plot of land and you can start growing your own food. To some people, the very idea of caring for other living things can be scary – what if all the plants die? Here’s the trick: start small and grow plants that can thrive in your area naturally. No green thumb is needed if you plant local.

An expert gardener has provide ten simple tips for first timers. You can do it!

2. START SMALL

If you are planning how to start a vegetable garden in your backyard then the potential size is likely dictated by what yard space you have. Some people may have grand plans when planning a kitchen garden, though if you are new to vegetable gardening then it may be best to start with a small space.

Starting with focusing on small vegetable garden ideas allows you to learn and get that satisfaction without the risk of getting frustrated by a large vegetable garden that gets weedy and out of control quickly. By starting small it means you can get a feel for how long things take to grow and nurture and the time involved in weeding, watering, fertilizing and harvesting.

It can take up more time than first expected and no-one wants to get disillusioned by turning over a huge space in their backyard to a vegetable garden that they don’t actually have the time in their busy lives to tend. If you do want to transform a large area, then it can be done slowly or sections not cultivated covered with thick cardboard or plastic to smother weeds.

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Instead of Pesticides, Use Plants

- Adam Clare

This is the year nobody should use pesticides, if you’re on the fence about using pesticides I’ll remind you that they do more harm than good. They negatively impact human health, kill unintended species, and even taint groundwater. Many smart gardeners already avoid using the killer chemicals and you too can be a smart gardener. Why use dangerous chemicals when you can use plants?

Over at PopSci they’ve complied a list of what plants in North America you should plant to protect your garden from pests.

You can find examples of pesticide plants stretching back thousands of years. Native Americans, for example, may have developed companion planting as early as 10,000 years ago, long before home gardening became a pastime. Although synthetic chemical-based pesticides have become common, you don’t need to follow that trend.

When you use plants to keep pests away, you’re employing a proven gardening technique backed by scientific research. Installing the right plants in your garden is fast, easy, and (the best part) extremely fun. If you’re not sure where to start, we have some suggestions for every planting zone in the US.

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Urban Farming Helps Cities Tackle the Climate Crisis

- Adam Clare

fruit store

Growing your own food is fun and possible, even in a tiny space, so everyone should give it a try. Cities are finding ways to encourage more people to grow food locally for a variety of reasons, and they all revolve around dealing with climate change. Cities become more resilient to climate change thanks to the benefits from an increase in urban farming. Those benefits range from local cooling effects from growing plants to the more serious food supply issues felt around the world. There’s no better time than now to try your hand at starting a small food garden.

Apart from private backyard gardens, urban gardening includes larger community gardens, allotment areas and building rooftops that allow people who don’t have backyards to also grow food. Ryerson University in downtown Toronto operates a rooftop farm on its engineering building that has a little under a quarter acre of growing space.

In that little space in the middle of the crowded city, the farm grows about 4,500 kilograms of food every year that supplies the university community and local chefs.
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Growing significant amounts of food within the city is not necessarily a new concept. Karen Landman, a professor at the University of Guelph who researches urban gardening, says agriculture used to be a part of North American cities before being gradually zoned out of urban areas after the First World War.

“It’s actually a very old practice,” she said. “There is a lot of land where it could be turned into food production. And if we really had to, we could produce a lot of food. There are other cities in the world where urban agriculture is the primary source of food for many people.”

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Join the No-Mow May Campaign

- Adam Clare

pollinator

Pollinators love the spring and they love your lawn….until you cut it. Spring time is when pollinators need a quick get up and go meal, which usually comes from those peppy plants popping through your lawn early in the season. You can help pollinators survive the spring by just being lazy and letting your grass grow. Yes, you can save the world by doing less.

Remember the best strategy for not mowing lawns is not to have one in the first place. Check out these lawn alternatives.

Conservation groups have been promoting the “No-Mow May” approach around the world.

Cormier said spring is a crucial time to help pollinators.

“Flowering plants in the spring, for example, can bloom and provide an early source of nectar for pollinators such as bees, hummingbirds, butterflies and beetles,” she said.

Cormier says allowing wildflowers and grasses to grow during this time will also help prevent pollutants and debris from travelling directly into freshwater ecosystems, and help with soil stabilization.

“We’re not asking for a lot of time. We’re asking for 4 weeks so hopefully maybe just take a break from mowing for a couple weeks, for the entire month just try it out. It’s a small commitment but maybe people will like it and I hope they do,” she said.

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Thanks to Kathryn!

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