Brendan Sayers
By way of getting to know me, I will begin by letting you know that I have a privileged life. When a teenager, at the time when you think of what you want to spend the remainder of your life doing, I chose to garden. Whether as a result of the exposure to nature and plants that I had been given from the older generations, or by the fact that during the ‘mentally tortuous’ adolescent years that I have found sanctuary in the garden, it is the case.
I am now in my third decade of being a serious gardener and have spent most of that time working at one of Europe’s magnificent botanic gardens. In my spare time I spend more time gardening than anything else, a type of gardening that provides me with the food I eat and growing the flowers I love. These endeavours have enriched my life beyond descriptive words and make my life at one with nature, at least as one can be these days.
The specific area in which I work leads me to be involved in tropical areas of the world where pressures on the environment and plants life are, or appear, different from the green island of Ireland. I say appear, as there are times that I wonder about the reaction to conservation efforts by the populous of my country with a new found wealth; prosperity is measured by new buildings, town expansion, land reclamation, intensive agriculture and vehicle size to name a few. There is little point in applying blame to whomever we see as the cause of this.
Our step forward needs to be in the direction of merging our daily lives with those of the other species that occupy our planet, be they fauna or flora. I truly believe that when a human takes to time to relax and observe the natural world that he cannot help but see himself as an integral part of it. The joy expressed by people who visit a garden – at some plant in flower, or a dragonfly perched on a bulrush leaf to the simple astonishment of a seed germinating – has to be the hook that will draw them closer to a life with nature.
The Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew in London used for a long time the line of ‘all life depends on plants’. I envied the fact that they had it as a footnote to each of the information signs, thinking that if I was to use it in my workplace that it would appear as plagiarism. After a while pondering it I realized that the line is a statement of fact, all life on the planet is dependant on the plants that nurture and nourish us. An even greater reason to cherish them!
The same task could be carried out with any group of plants; I suppose all each of you need to do is look outside your window. Each and every plant has a story to offer, many well documented such as the intriguing pollination system of Coryanthes speciosa, the bucket orchid. On opening of a flower the bucket shaped petal of the orchid is filled to a specific point with a mysterious liquid that is exuded from two glands. This liquid, capable of intoxicating a bee, which falls into the pool of liquid, provides the escape route for the insect also. Swimming to the only gap that allows it to escape from the pool makes it come in contact with the sexual parts of the flower. The pollinating bees will either pick up pollen or deposit it on a second visit. If pollination is successful seed will be produced which will go on to have more interactions with animal life. Coryanthes prefer to grow in ant nests where they are protected from herbivores by the ants. It is a fascinating story and one that we may not know all the elements of.
To see an image of the bucket orchid visit the website of Belize Botanic Gardens along with many other orchids that grow in the small Central American country. It is a place that I visit almost every year to work on the orchid flora and where I have seen the effects of what tourism can do to a developing country. Many of these effects are not positive. As tourists to parts of the world that we are drawn to because of their natural beauty, we need to be respectful and careful of our footprints.
So what is Planting for the Planet and how will it affect your life? I hope that the missives that I write about from time to time will inspire you to delve more into a life of plants. It has helped me to be more of the web of life than the top notch, which in one respect is only true in some respects. Hopefully they will encourage you to grow, grow, grow – not only plants but also in life.
There is a parallel that occurs when one is at home in the garden. Our lives fall into synchronisation. When we are happiest curled up close to a warm log fire the garden is asleep for the most part; when we are enlivened by the spring sunshine, plants are awakening. When we like to laze in the summer sun plants are just doing their thing slowly; and when we get that urge to catch the most of it while it lasts they are finally slowing down and ripening their bounty. How did we ever lose that contact!