Guest blog by Kate
Mawer – WI Climate Ambassador, Braunston WI, Northamptonshire Federation
As an amateur gardener I enjoy the uncertainty that working
with the seasons brings. Gardeners are adaptable people, it is no surprise when
a late frost catches us out and an apple crop is poor or when a mild winter brings
more devastation from slugs to our hostas. The changes we experience year on
year can be part of the fun and is what maintains our passion for gardening.
This year my herbaceous perennials are looking wonderful, filling every gap in
my garden, and the new planting in the village community garden has established
quickly because of the spring and summer rain.
It is the greater occurrence of more extreme weather events
that is the concern of the gardener. I am fortunate that my garden is not in a
flood risk area and so I have not had to replace a garden that has been
devastated by floods. As chairperson of the Braunston Village Gardens
Association gardeners are telling me about how they have had to replant their
produce gardens this year as they have lost a high proportion of their first
plantings due to the wet and increase in pests. This is costly, time consuming
and demoralising.
As gardeners we are custodians of biodiversity. Extreme
weather events create uncertainty. Gardeners may be put off by the challenges of
new diseases and unfamiliar pests that are difficult to control. It is a
concern that for some the solution is to replace plants with hard landscaping
or artificial turf reducing the opportunities for wildlife to thrive and ironically
further adding to the issue of flooding.
Climate change is complex. Planting Mediterranean gardens
and investing in a water butt system, at one time popular suggestions for
gardeners coping with climate change, is not a solution when the dry summer has
been replaced by one of the wettest on record.
I, like other gardeners, appreciate the physical and
emotional health benefits of this hobby. We will continue to garden and even
thrive on achieving successes despite the unusual seasons. We are significant
players in terms of food production, wildlife conservation and flood control
and understand that working with others now to limit carbon emissions will make
a significant difference and benefit the gardeners of the future.
Join us from 8th-16th October in a Week of Action to
celebrate the people, places and things we want to protect from climate change,
and make sure MPs feel that love. People all over the UK will be lobbying their
MPs in their local area, and we'd love you to be involved.
We'll be seeing nature walks, tea parties, classic lobbies,
community energy visits and all sorts of other events to show MPs why you would
like them to take action to protect your community from the impacts of climate
change. All this will involve MPs so that politicians see, feel and hear how
much their constituents care about what we could lose to climate change.
More details, including an action pack and a range of
resources to support you, are available on the NFWI website at www.theWI.org.uk/climate-change
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