Thursday 29th August
Entangled Life
Merlin Sheldrake - In conversation with - Humaira Ikram
When we think of fungi, we probably think of mushrooms. But mushrooms are only fruiting bodies, analogous to apples on a tree. Most fungi live out of sight, yet make up a massively diverse kingdom of organisms that support and sustain nearly all living systems. The more we learn about fungi, the less makes sense without them. Take a mind-bending journey into this hidden world ranging from yeast to psychedelics, to the fungi that sprawl for miles underground and are the largest organisms on the planet, to those that make all plant life possible, and those that infiltrate and manipulate insect bodies with devastating precision. We have a lot to learn about how we could be gardening by digging deeper into this fascinating realm.
Plants and the Soil Food Web Story: The Beginning, a Muddle, and the End-Ophytes
Eddie Bailey
Land plants have been around for 470 million years. They grow on virtually every substrate, in almost all climatic conditions. But be they tiny or towering, muted or magnificent, they owe their robust growth, their survival, indeed their very existence to microorganisms. Today the microbial habitat, the soil, lies in ruin over huge swaths of the Earth’s productive space, including our gardens. And our plants, our health and bank balances are suffering the consequences. We need to shift our perspective and reconnect with the power of the microbes by providing the habitat and support they need to grow plants as nature intended.
Understanding Perennials Where It Matters – Underground!
Noel Kingsbury
Physicists talk about a 'Theory of Everything'. We now have it for perennials! Perennials show a vast range of forms and behaviours and are difficult to neatly categorise. Much of this is to do with the fact that what we see is herbaceous, i.e. temporary growth. The permanent heart of the plant is hidden away in the soil. Building on research done in Poland in the 1960s and some more recent Czech work, it is possible to have a much better understanding of perennials. Understanding what goes on underground can help us predict longevity, plant rate and pattern of spread, how competitive they will be, and more. Our decisions as gardeners, designers and horticultural managers can now be more firmly rooted in evidence.
Plant-Soil Feedbacks: Heroes and Villains in a Changing World
Ellen Fry
Plant-Soil Feedbacks shape plant communities in both natural and man-made settings. While we have known about the effect of plants on their surroundings for centuries, we are only now beginning to understand how these work, who are the main players, and what this might mean as our planet comes under increasing stress from a growing, hungry population. Crop rotations have been a notable historic response to ‘soil sickness’, and current state of the art research reveals much more, including some heroes and villains in horticulture, as well as the implications of climate change on these important species.
Take a Breath: Stomatal Behaviour for Optimising Photosynthesis, Water Use and Keeping Cool
Tracy Lawson
Stomata, the small pore on the surface of most aerial parts of the plant adjust aperture to ensure CO2 uptake for photosynthesis and plant growth. However, as a consequence of being open, water is lost from the plant by transpiration, so stomata must respond to environmental cues and internal signals to balance CO2 uptake with water loss. Transpiration is important for nutrient uptake from the soil, and the evaporative water loss from the leaves is key for plants to maintain temperature. Understanding how these processes and the different sizes and shapes of stomatal complexes influence these key processes in plant’s lives can inform the ways in which we can interact with them more positively and effectively.
New Perspectives - Audience Q&A
Moderator - Stephanie Mahon
Panel - Ellen Fry, Noel Kingsbury, Tracy Lawson
The ways in which plants behave and the incredible actions they perform as they live through their life cycles, interacting symbiotically with other species below and above ground, can inform how we can garden in more ecologically astute ways. What more can plant science tell us about how we can adapt and improve the ways in which we garden?
Deep Places: Lessons From the Bog
Alys Fowler
The bog ecosystem has much to teach us about how to be in community with place. From the peat archive to the living layer, the bog is a place steeped in ways of being that embrace both the local and global. Despite centuries of trying to control bogs through drainage and milling, they remain resolutely of themselves and can teach us much about how we should respect the culture of an ecosystem and how we might embrace the sovereignty of our own garden soils.
Underground to Mainstream
Moderator - Humaira Ikram
Panel - Merlin Sheldrake, Lucy Michaels, Eddie Bailey
Mind-blowing insights into the behaviour of fungi and bacteria in the soil, and their interactions with plants, make us reevaluate how we think about the natural world around us and particularly how our actions affect the lifeforms teeming in our gardens. What is currently happening in research and what directions is it likely to take us? How can these messages be amplified so that these ideas become commonplace for all gardeners?
Cornerstones
Benedict MacDonald - In conversation with - John Little
Cornerstone species play a major role in maintaining healthy and diverse natural ecosystems, and lie at the heart of addressing global warming, flooding, drought and catastrophic biodiversity loss. From familiar yet imperilled honeybees and ancient oak woods to returning natives like beavers and boars, Britain's cornerstone species may hold the key to recovering our biodiversity on land and in our seas. How can humans, the most important cornerstone species of all, become the greatest stewards of the natural world in both the wider environment and in our gardens?
Gardening in a Web of Ecological Connections
Moderator - Errol Reuben Fernandes
Panel - Owen Hayman, Sheila Das, Cleve West
The more that we learn about the relationships between plants and other species in our gardens, the more questions and dilemmas we face. How can we ensure that we are taking into account all of the complex interactions that are essential for biodiversity when we are gardening? How can we make the best possible decisions when there are always consequences that we can’t control? What are the most appropriate new approaches we should be taking to create diverse and abundant ecosystems, and are there new ethics involved?
Friday 30th August
Looking Backwards, Moving Forwards
Dan Pearson
Garden legacies have an uneasy relationship with the future. How can they preserve their original groundbreaking originality and still have a relevance many years later? How are ideas, ethos and style embodied in the spirit of a place and how do they change with time? Beth Chatto’s pioneering work is clearly manifested in all aspects of her garden, but six years since her passing in March 2018, what are the next steps for the iconic listed garden?
Adding Sparkle: Designed Superblooms and Creative Dynamic Planting
Nigel Dunnett
Delve into the world of annuals, biennials, short-lived perennials, and dynamic self-seeders, and their use and role in designed plantings, taking inspiration from amazing natural ‘superblooms’ around the world. Using long-term monitoring from a range of real projects, the role of these dynamic plants within long-term and permanent schemes will be explored, as well as their use in short-term and temporary projects, and establishment and management methods through direct seeding or a combination of seeding and planting.
Plant Selection
Moderator - Sally O’Hallaran
Panel - Alex Clarke, Chris Gibson, Jo McKerr
What does ‘right plant right place’ mean in 2024? When Beth Chatto made this statement over 60 years ago, she was advising gardeners to look to their gardens and then match the plant to the conditions they found. How have things changed since them and what is the relevance of this concept today? What skills are needed to understand site conditions while recognising the unpredictable impacts of climate change to make resilient plant choices? Understanding which plants can withstand these challenges is key to successful plant selection.
Adventures in Ecological Horticulture
Rebecca McMackin
Every garden is vastly improved by a cloud of butterflies. Stunningly beautiful gardens can also contain thriving wildlife habitat, even in some of the toughest conditions. It’s hard to imagine more difficult environments than a concrete pier in New York City, a busy Brooklyn intersection, or a 200 year old cemetery in the Bronx, but all three projects now provide host plants for butterflies, pollen for specialist bees, and nesting for migratory birds. Gardeners all over the world are adapting their practice to support biodiversity. Explore the philosophy and techniques currently in practice in North America.
Plants, Knowledge and Power
Darryl Moore
Ecological horticulture requires a new mindset, working with natural processes rather than against them, which can often seem to be counterintuitive to traditional practices. Understanding plants’ lifecycles and how they are adapting to a changing climate is key for developing new best practices. Education and sharing information across the industry, from growing and designing to aftercare, is vital. So what are the best ways of bringing together research, monitoring and practical experience? And how do we change the common perception of the industry as low skilled, to that of valuable knowledge workers with the skills to address the challenges of climate change and biodiversity loss.
Gardeners: Recognising Gardeners and Shifting the Emphasis From 'Capital into Care'
Moderator - John Little & Benny Hawksbee
Panel - Stephanie Li, Alex Antoniou, Aimee Spanswick
So many questions surround the working lives of gardeners and now is the time to discuss them. Are gardeners really valued enough, are they duly recognised as the cornerstones of community, and to what extent is the garden the gardener? Given the pressing ecological and economic demands we face, should we move away from expensive front-loaded design and focus more on the aftercare and evolution of gardens, putting gardeners centre stage and compensating them accordingly?
The Accidental Garden
Richard Mabey - In conversation with - James Canton, Darryl Moore
We regard gardens as our personal dominions, where we can create whatever worlds we desire. But they are also occupied by myriads of other organisms, all with their own lives to lead. They are microcosms of what is happening in the larger world. In the ‘accidental’ garden nature becomes an equal partner, a 'gardener' itself. Challenging the traditional dominant role of humans, it reorganises itself whether we like it or not, and forces us to reconsider our relationships to it and the roles we perform within it. The garden becomes a place of cultural and ecological fusion, and perhaps a metaphor for the troubled planet.
Urban Futures With Spontaneous Plants
Norbert Kühn
Spontaneous vegetation is unplanned and develops of its own accord. It adapts to the conditions of a location. In an urban climate, these plants are heat-resistant and drought-resistant. Spontaneous vegetation therefore shows us what type of vegetation will predominate in a city in the future. A closer look at spontaneous vegetation as part of new types of ecosystems can already provide answers to the central questions and challenges of the Anthropocene. Due to its many advantages, spontaneous vegetation is increasingly being incorporated into the design of modern parks.
Art and Environment: Message, Medium & Mission
Moderator - Joanne Ooi
Panel - Henry Driver, Veronica Sekules, Julian Perry
Art can be an important complement to environmental activism, examining the processes of the natural world and the ways in which we perceive, interpret and represent them. In what ways are the change makers at the forefront of environmental art using their creative practices to push boundaries, investigate new realms, engage audiences and break down barriers between people and the world around them?
Shrouded In Light: Illuminating the Wild Potential of Shrublands
Kevin Philip Williams & Michael Guidi
Shrublands exist all around us, thriving in almost any environmental condition, from the arctic tundra to the sweltering tropics. These diverse and inspiring ecosystems not only serve as compelling models for our future gardens, providing nurturing habitats within their tangled architecture and demonstrating extreme resilience in the face of a changing climate, but offer a challenge to conventional garden-making through their intense aesthetics and obscured intentions. Explore a glorious spectrum of shrublands, revealing the ecological, artistic, and philosophical implications of gardening with these magnificent creatures.
Communicating connections
Moderator - Arit Anderson
Panel - Ashley Edwards, Rebecca McMackin, Sarah Wilson
The more we learn about ecological connections between plants and other species, both below and above ground, the more knowledge we have to develop our horticultural processes into sensitive and all all-encompassing practices. But how do we explain what we are doing to clients and the public? What means and platforms are at our disposal to spread the message and get more people on board, and who should be doing this?