 Book
Reviews
with Robin Osborne
Create a Sunsmart, Waterwise Garden
By Linda Ross
Simon & Schuster $29.95
Elegantly designed and perfectly timed for summer, Linda Ross's 160-page collection of gardening tactics and techniques is aimed at helping plan and maintain better looking gardens as well as reducing water bills and saving this most precious of resources.
'Creating a beautiful garden with unreliable rain and limited water resources is the greatest challenge facing green thumbs today,' as she explains, adding the sobering thought that the nation uses more water per capita than any other country.
As most of us have come to appreciate, this consumption pattern needs to change, and it would be tragic if it were to be accompanied by a widespread abandonment of our natural spaces.
The aim of this easily followed book is changing water hungry gardens into 'knockout waterwise' ones, in the process trimming 40 per cent off our water bills. Conceding that garden design is 'one of the most difficult of all arts,' Ross doesn't shy away from the reality that 'Good gardening takes time, perseverance, inspiration, a lot of sweat and usually a few tears along the way.'
The upside is that the process helps us get fit, enables our minds to relax and puts us in touch with nature - so we can more time in the plant shop and less at the doctor's.
As ever, the development of a timetable based on good planning can do a great deal to get things rolling efficiently. However, delightful, even famous gardens can spring up without a master plan, even is if it advisable to press the 'pause' button before charging ahead in earnest.
Essential groundwork includes bed construction, appropriate surfaces, installing a water tank - a wide variety is illustrated - and planning shady and wind-free areas, as well as water-zoning spaces into medium, low and no water usage: 'Then a watering system can be designed for certain sections of your garden, preventing waste, over watering and fungal problems.'
Showing that the focus is not only suburban blocks, such innovations as worm farms, composting toilets, outdoor entertaining areas and the design of water features are also explained, along with 'rethinking the lawn' and developing one or other type of bush garden, whether inland or coastal.
Of course suitable plant selection lies at the heart of minimising water use, and Ross's species knowledge is useful regarding non-thirsty natives or exotic succulents such as the cactus and agave families.
Rounding off the possibilities, she describes theme gardens such as Greek and Californian/Mexican, again offering good, practical pre-summer advice.
- Books available at Book Warehouse, Keen Street, Lismore and at Lismore Shopping
Square.
|
