Wall and Piece

"Everyone has to scratch on walls somewhere or they go crazy."

--Michael Ondaatje, In the Skin of a Lion

Book review: Edgelands-- Journeys into England's True Wilderness

Sometimes it takes takes a poet or an artist to get us to look at something that's right in front of us. Such is the latest book that I am reading called Edgelands: Journeys into England's True Wilderness (Vintage Books, 2012). Deliciously written, the authors are English poets Paul Farley and Michael Symmons Roberts. As children in the 1970s they wandered the industrial wastescapes of Liverpool and Manchester, which became their boyhood playgrounds. Today, they serve as literary ambassadors to escort us deep into these edgelands. Chapters are broken into landscape type or elements that are common to all edgelands: paths, dens, canals, ruins, pallets, wire, and containers. These forgotten lands and cast aside items are not the romanticized visions of Claude Lorraine ruins, these are real places in all their naked glory. But their text takes on an ugly beauty with texture and color, like watching a steel drum rust into a beautiful patina. Here's a sample from their Introduction, "Somewhere in the hollows and spaces between our carefully managed wilderness areas and the creeping, flattening effects of global capitalism, there are still places where an overlooked England truly exists, places where ruderals familiar here since the last ice sheets retreated have found a way to live with each successive wave of new arrivals, places where the city's dirty secrets are laid bare, and successive human utilities scar the earth or stand cheek by jowl with one another; complicated, unexamined places that thrive on disregard, if we could only put aside our nostalgia for places we've never really known and see them afresh."

Does My Backyard Matter When It Comes to Urban Biodiversity?

 bee balm

Yes. Even if you have a tiny property that is surrounded by a sea of concrete, your greenspace is important. In fact it becomes even more crucial to insects and wildlife if there are few other choices available. Jean-Pierre Savard et al state in their 1999 paper, “Biodiversity concepts and urban ecosystems,” that all scales of biodiverse landscapes are critical “ranging from individual plants to the entire city itself and even its surrounding areas.” That’s because urban ecosystems work on multiple levels which are linked together (Allen and Starr, 1982). Let’s say that you plant a nice row of bee balm in your flower bed which are dined upon by a few hummingbirds. Your plants are valuable because they form a part of the hummingbird food chain that exists in your neighborhood. While some properties have landscape types that are best suited for nesting or shelter, others comprise the daily hummingbird food buffet. This is why hummers become so territorial when they find a good food source. There is an even more important reason for you to encourage biodiversity on your property—because you can influence your neighbor’s landscapes. If they see your yard full of butterflies and hummingbirds after the addition of a few plants, they may be inclined to plant a few as well. Don’t believe me? Take a look at neighborhoods that paint the bottoms of their trees white, there is no other explanation for collateral tree painting. So you should never feel that it’s hopeless to create a greener environment, because your backyard is one of the most valuable places to start.

Chicago Parks Are Using Natural Lawn Care Basics

The city of Chicago is telling its residents that having dandelions in lawns are okay. According to the Chicago Tribune, the Chicago Park District is avoiding the use of herbicides in 90 percent of its public lands. Michael Thompson, director of Chicago Honey Co-op, says that dandelions bloom at an important time for bee development and provide a crucial food source for pollinating insects. The city is also trying to save on annual lawn maintenance costs. Weedkiller applications cost the city an average of $240 per acre per application, which the Tribune estimates at $1.4 million in city savings.