Maybe it's because I'm outside more, but I'm noticing the small things. Bees, flies, ants, moths, ichneumon, beetles. Noticing, and feeling like giving them more space. Leaving weeds to shelter my beetles. Allowing the allotment edges to get fat with thatch. Trying not to grudge the occasional pansy-gobbling slugfest in my containers.
As lockdown continues, verges are growing and weeds are crawling out into the unswept places. I love this sparkle of green, this fuzzy growing around the hard grey lines of civilisation. I find myself thinking - yes, I know we have to get rid of it before it's damage, but could we do that less often? Longer verges soft under my feet thick with clover and buttercups - could we cut more of our municipal grass meadow-style, less often and with an end-point for the grasses, rather than lawn style, with clipping mulch driving out everything but the green conqueror?
I always love hearing about other cities that have walked this path, and Curridabat in Costa Rica sounds lovely, and not just because this is a city that has urban humming birds, but because they are consulted as part of urban planning. They are citizens, with their needs considered alongside the humans. Every street is a biocorridor, every neighbourhood an ecosystem. Green spaces are included alongside the other infrastructure complete, with assessment for pollinators, cooling effects, pollution shielding. Nature is not distant in this city; it is the city.
It is also no longer a barrier to wildlife, which passes through the newly-permeable space, skipping and hopscotching from green to green. Ecological connectivity is no longer a secret, furtive dash through a street, back alley or boxed-in river, but a classy swagger up the main green line into town, to dart and flash for the city dwellers who smile and say, my green, my animals, my nature.
Read more: Sweet City - the Costa Rica Suburb that granted citizenship to its bees, birds and butterflies
As lockdown continues, verges are growing and weeds are crawling out into the unswept places. I love this sparkle of green, this fuzzy growing around the hard grey lines of civilisation. I find myself thinking - yes, I know we have to get rid of it before it's damage, but could we do that less often? Longer verges soft under my feet thick with clover and buttercups - could we cut more of our municipal grass meadow-style, less often and with an end-point for the grasses, rather than lawn style, with clipping mulch driving out everything but the green conqueror?
I always love hearing about other cities that have walked this path, and Curridabat in Costa Rica sounds lovely, and not just because this is a city that has urban humming birds, but because they are consulted as part of urban planning. They are citizens, with their needs considered alongside the humans. Every street is a biocorridor, every neighbourhood an ecosystem. Green spaces are included alongside the other infrastructure complete, with assessment for pollinators, cooling effects, pollution shielding. Nature is not distant in this city; it is the city.
It is also no longer a barrier to wildlife, which passes through the newly-permeable space, skipping and hopscotching from green to green. Ecological connectivity is no longer a secret, furtive dash through a street, back alley or boxed-in river, but a classy swagger up the main green line into town, to dart and flash for the city dwellers who smile and say, my green, my animals, my nature.
Read more: Sweet City - the Costa Rica Suburb that granted citizenship to its bees, birds and butterflies
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