When I first started landscaping around 10 years ago, it seemed that every client’s mantra was “no maintenance” and this was more often than not transposed into a garden design that, in order to satisfy the client, mostly comprised concrete paving, lots of gravel, a lawn and perhaps a handful of pots.
In the years since and particularly since I found my own feet as a designer in 2005, I am still frequently met with the “no maintenance” brief; these days however I am obliged to convince the client that there is in fact no such thing and steer them toward an idea of manageable maintenance that must, for a whole host of reasons, include as broad a spectrum of plants (and trees) as practically allows.
Like that last gasp of breath that finally snuffs out the candle-flame in the hopeless confines of a dungeon cell: ill-advised landscaping schemes, although individually small, have collectively harmed the quality of urban and suburban wildlife environments to devastating effect, especially when employed in tandem within the ever-increasing green-belt-evaporating new housing developments that spread so many of our towns and cities.
The plight of the humble bee has been signified in the past few years as a detriment of such arrogant development. In the UK honey bee numbers have halved in the past 25 years while numbers of bumblebees have fallen by around 60 per cent since 1970 with three species going extinct and seven suffering serious declines.
Save our bees: the detriment of arrogant development and the plants that could halt bee decline.
When I first started landscaping around 10 years ago, it seemed that every client’s mantra was “no maintenance” and this was more often than not transposed into a garden design that, in order to satisfy the client, mostly comprised concrete paving, lots of gravel, a lawn and perhaps a handful of pots.
In the years since and particularly since I found my own feet as a designer in 2005, I am still frequently met with the “no maintenance” brief; these days however I am obliged to convince the client that there is in fact no such thing and steer them toward an idea of manageable maintenance that must, for a whole host of reasons, include as broad a spectrum of plants (and trees) as practically allows.
Like that last gasp of breath that finally snuffs out the candle-flame in the hopeless confines of a dungeon cell: ill-advised landscaping schemes, although individually small, have collectively harmed the quality of urban and suburban wildlife environments to devastating effect, especially when employed in tandem within the ever-increasing green-belt-evaporating new housing developments that spread so many of our towns and cities.
The plight of the humble bee has been signified in the past few years as a detriment of such arrogant development. In the UK honey bee numbers have halved in the past 25 years while numbers of bumblebees have fallen by around 60 per cent since 1970 with three species going extinct and seven suffering serious declines.
The Telegraph’s Richard Gray discusses how the loss of wild flowers and disease are thought to have caused bee numbers to plummet in recent years and what plants scientists now urge us to be mindful of including in our gardens and public spaces.
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