DIARY OF A GARDENER

I’ve succumbed to a trend weaving its way around inner city urban homesteads – gardening! Not just the flower bed type of gardening but the organic vegetable ecologically biodiversity friendly planet saving, get down with papatuanuku roots- type of gardening.

The thing about city folk and gardening is that there’s a tendency for the urban-dwellers to think they’ve reinvented it into an art form. Of course there’s beauty in the aesthetics, there’s colour texture, form and style, no doubt about it. Go to any townie-farmers’ market like Grey Lynn and that’s where you hear them, chattering on about organic match this, companion mix that, death to pesticides, life to anything with the first three letters E.C.O or B.I.O. They’re a funny bunch these city mulches, fervently spreading their organic wisdom over a sprawling metropolis trying to lessen the impact of urban erosion. They’re well meaning if a little naïve. They’re really easy to spot. They’re the ones in tight black gym leggings, clean manicured nails, designer gardening tools bought from Republic, and oh, they don’t grow enough produce of their own to sell and they can’t bake. Instead they peruse the stalls, picking up herbs, feijoa wine organic of course, choko butter organic of course and they talk meaningfully about micro-greens when really they mean broccoli. The city-mulchers, pop free-range eggs into Trelise Cooper biodegradable hessian shopping bags before zooming off in their gas guzzling SUV’s, to have double shot lattes with BFF at upmarket SPQR in Ponsonby. Yes indeed these are the city-mulches, the ones who slum it for an hour on Sunday mornings in Grey Lynn and convince themselves they’re eco-friendly environmentalists. Well I’ve joined them, minus the gym leggings, manicured nails, SUV and designer gardening tools.

When I say I’ve joined them, I mean I’ve taken to turning over patches of soil in my backyard to get it ready for herbs. I’m really partial to lettuces of all types so they’re a must have. Tomato seeds and punnets are in plentiful supply at all big red sheds, garden centres and markets. While silver beet is compulsory, it’s so easy to grow it’s almost a weed. At this very early planning phase of my gardening career like the city mulches I won’t be producing enough to sell.

In fact those that do peddle their product at farmers’ markets like Grey Lynn are true earth people. Farmers’ markets are for locals who sell to locals. The idea is, by keeping it close to home reduces transport costs and therefore carbon footprints. It’s also about community spirit, sharing ideas on how to grow healthy sustainable environments in an urban setting. And it’s all about good nutritious kai. If you can spot a city-mulcher, then it’s just as easy to spy a peddler. They look like their produce - organic. They have dirty-tuffty hair, leathery skin and whether male or female they’re always slim. I have never seen an over weight organic produce supplier. They also look like they’d rather hug a tree than a human. Since I’m making wild generalisations they would be Green Party voters and Labour would be as far right as they could possibly stretch. So just to reiterate, I’m not a peddler and I don’t think in all honesty I will ever be one. But who knows?


So why the sudden urge to garden? I’ve been meaning to create a vegetable garden for some time now. But time and place has been against me, until now. Now I have the time and I have a very manageable north-east facing backyard that gets all day sun. I’m not a complete stranger to gardening. I’ve maintained a few plots in my earlier years before my television production company consumed my energy. In fact I produced a bumper crop from a Balmoral Auckland backyard that I could very well have proudly taken to market. The plot backed on to our neighbour’s vegetable garden. I’ve long forgotten the blokes name but we’d meet up at least a couple of times a week, he was a scientist at Mt Albert’s DSIR. I never met his wife, he said he had one and he always talked about her but in the two years we gardened together she never appeared. Strange.

My pride and joy were the tomatoes which were to die for. They were grown from cuttings given to me by my wonderful Australian friends Bluey and Barbara-Ann Nowell. They were a solid reliable red, juicy like oranges and not too salty or acidic to the taste buds. My apple cucumbers and beetroot were revered by the flatmates. Joanne Marsh our resident chef made sumptuous salads with my crop. The plant I nurtured with love and affection was the parsley. I fell in love with its bitter-sweet fragrance. When I bruised it between my fingers the scent permeated the air and lingered for minutes. Its tickling texture invited constant stroking and when I ate it I became addicted. Of course it was only that one parsley plant from Balmoral that I was obsessed with. Perhaps because it was the first of its type I’d planted. Maybe I was transferring some kind of sexual release onto the poor plant; I was single back then, although a cucumber would have been a better fetish. When the flat broke up, I didn’t think to pull up the plants or take cuttings with me. I returned to the Balmoral house months later with trowel and bucket in hand to take cuttings of the tomato plants and to retrieve my beloved parsley. Alas, my heart sank. The whole plot had been levelled and in its place a shiny new garage. I was also surprised to see the neighbours plot looking neglected and forlorn. Life of a vegetable plant is indeed a short one.

So now I’m in Mt Albert with my little family ready to plant anew. Times have changed; organic is the name of the game. So I’m looking forward to learning new things and trying new produce.

If anyone has any hints for me on how to do it better, bigger and earth friendlier, I’d welcome the feedback.