The Ecological Gardener: How to Create Beauty and Biodiversity from the Soil Up

by Matt Rees-Warren

Overview

Design a garden for the future—because what we grow matters.

"Matt Rees-Warren explains why every square inch of Earth, including our gardens, has ecological significance... Excellent, timely, essential!" —Douglas W. Tallamy, author of Nature’s Best Hope

Transform your garden into a self-sustaining haven for nature and wildlife. Ecological garden designer Matt Rees-Warren shares inspirational design ideas and practical projects to help you create a garden that is both beautiful today and sustainable tomorrow.

The Ecological Gardener will give you the tools to create an abundant, healthy garden from the soil up—a garden that welcomes birds and bees and allows native planting and wild flowers to flourish, with minimal carbon impact or need for fresh water. This book can guide both novice and experienced gardeners alike in their journey to a more ecological approach, and is full of practical projects and information, including:                      

• Finding the right design for your space
• Creating a wildflower meadow
• Building rainwater catchments and other tips for water conservation
• Making compost from kitchen waste, leaf mold, compost tea and more
• Creating a space for wildlife such as hedgehogs, bees and other pollinators
• Finding beauty in your garden during the winter

Matt will show you how to re-imagine how you garden, working with nature instead of controlling it, to create a space that promotes both wildlife and beauty. 

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781645020073
Publisher:	Chelsea Green Publishing UK
Publication date:	04/29/2021
Pages:	224
Sales rank:	1,023,005
Product dimensions:	9.60(w) x 6.90(h) x 0.60(d)

About the Author

Matt Rees-Warren is an ecological gardener, designer and writer. During 15 years of life in the ‘outside’, he’s worked for the National Trust, been head gardener at Kilver Court Gardens, Somerset, had articles published in RHS The Garden, Somerset Life, and Country Gardener, and designed gardens for private clients in and around the South West. Through his work, Matt has looked to illuminate, propose and develop ecological gardening methods and practices. As an advocate of organic gardening, permaculture, no-dig gardening and wildlife gardening, among other practices, his style and ethos reflect the changing relationship between ourselves, our gardens and the natural world. 

Table of Contents

Introduction 1

1 Design 7

The Soil Test 10

The Water Test 11

Creating Outline Drawings 15

Marking Out a Path 21

2 Soil 39

The 'Diamond' Compost Bay System 49

Making and Using a Bokashi Bin 54

Brewing Compost Tea 57

The 'Open-Pit' Biochar Method 61

Building a Vermicompost Stack-House 66

3 Plants 73

Turning a Lawn into a Wildflower Meadow 87

Planting a Native Country Hedgerow 92

Laying a Hedgerow 96

Collecting Seed 104

Taking Cuttings 106

Dividing Plants 108

4 Water 115

Fitting a Whisky-Barrel Rain Collector 120

Starting a Rain Garden 132

Making a Bathtub Reed Bed 136

Building a Keyhole Garden 138

Creating a Hessian-Sack Vertical Garden 143

5 Wildlife 145

Building a Pallet Bug Palace 156

Creating a Natural Clay-Lined Pond 160

Making a Raised Nettle Bed 166

6 Materials 173

Coppicing a Hazel 184

Sharpening a Blade with a Waterstone 189

Using Hessian Wraps for Plants 192

Upcycling Tin Cans for Pots 194

Making Mud Mortars 196

Acknowledgements 201

Resources 203

Index 207

Editorial Reviews

04/19/2021

British garden designer Rees-Warren puts “ecological considerations above all else” in his passionate debut on understanding gardens’ function as the “great green lungs of every nation.” Championing a mindset that favors responding to a landscape, Rees-Warren argues for fostering ecosystems rather than creating gardens that work against nature: “abandon minimalism and monocultures” and observe what’s already happening, he advises. Rees-Warren points out the damage caused by nonorganic fertilizer, overcultivation, and wild habitat destruction, and offers pointers on testing soil, drainage, different methods for composting, creating meadows, harvesting rainwater, and recycling waste water from home appliances. He also touts the importance of caring for native species that support resident and migratory birds, honeybees, and butterflies. (U.S. readers, though, should be prepared for discussions of plants native to England and metric measurements.) Throughout, the author makes a convincing case that while reimagining one’s way of gardening may seem like a small thing, it can have an outsize impact on Earth’s ecological crisis. Gardeners with a zero-waste mindset will find much to be excited by. (Apr.)

Publishers Weekly

‘Engaging and quirky; full of ideas and inspiration for garden projects that you’ll be itching to try for yourself.’—Dave Goulson, author of The Garden Jungle

‘Finally, a book for UK gardeners who recognise the desperate need to share their gardens with nature. In The Ecological Gardener, Matt Rees-Warren explains why every square inch of planet Earth, including our gardens, has ecological significance, and he tells us exactly how to increase that significance in ways that will benefit us all. Excellent, timely, essential!’—Douglas W. Tallamy, author of Nature’s Best Hope

‘Matt Rees-Warren has distilled his experience, observation and passion for the natural world into an incredibly informative narrative, with practical examples to help us tread lightly on the land. Gardens are for people, but in our endeavour to create beauty, we forget that our space is shared with cohabitants and time. Matt takes us through the garden with an ecological lens – just what we need to view a future that is in harmony with nature itself.’—Arit Anderson, garden designer, chartered member of The Landscape Institute

‘Gardening for nature shouldn’t be a radical act, but it takes courage to trade power tools and pesticides for hand tools and native plants. The Ecological Gardener helps you brave the rewilding of your own patch through practical, inspirational advice for growing lightly on the land. With Matt Rees-Warren and the natural world as your guides, you can welcome all your wild neighbors, from slugs to the newts who eat them, to your life-sustaining space.’—Nancy Lawson, author of The Humane Gardener

‘Gardening fads and styles come and go, from topiaries to green walls to Tropicalisimo. Yet the arc of understanding what a garden is slowly bends to the less controlled and naturally friendly. As our understanding of the connectedness and mostly concealed weave and warp of “life entire” gains steam, so too does our desire to fully embrace the whole. Within this context, Matt Rees-Warren does an admirable job in explaining the objectives while providing the garden-maker a satisfyingly readable map from which to find one’s personal paradise that welcomes the natural world into our own backyard.’—Daniel J. Hinkley, author of Windcliff and The Explorer’s Garden

"The accompanying narrative is what sets this book apart; the breadth and depth of Rees-Warren’s experience allows him reflections that result in a philosophical exploration that is far more than just instruction (though the instruction is high quality, too)."—Booklist

From the Publisher

04/01/2021

British landscape designer Rees-Warren's gardening philosophy is best encapsulated in the expression "The longest journey begins with a single step." Rees-Warren believes that if everyone with a garden were to incorporate some simple, planet-saving steps, it would go a long way toward reversing the global threats posed by climate change. The book's guidance ranges from basics of soil analysis and principles of garden design, to more practical hands-on projects like making a whiskey-barrel rain collector or building a vermicompost stack-house; the author's strong commitment to creating sustainable green spaces and his desire to share his extensive knowledge with others shine through. U.S.-based gardeners will want to note that the measurements used in the book are metric, and its focus is on plants native to the UK. VERDICT Those with a serious desire to learn more about creating ecologically friendly gardens will find much to muse over in Rees-Warren's bracing mix of philosophical and practical landscape advice.—John Charles, formerly of Scottsdale P.L., AZ

Library Journal