The Future of New Zealand Gardens

Our travels around New Zealand from January through May of 2006 showed us that the influences from the islands' British past are still much in evidence. However, as in Canada and the US, there are increasing signs of the emergence of a unique gardening identity that embraces the local climate, conditions, culture, and plants.

Young landscape architects are selecting from this rich heritage, and many are blending both European and American influences into their work again, while remaining sensitive to native ecological issues.

A recent (May 2006) issue of New Zealand's Next magazine profiled a number of young students, graduates, and a lecturer from the landscape architecture program at Unitec, a polytechnic in Auckland. Snippets from their interviews provide an insight into the scope of New Zealand gardening today:

Debbie Upton (graduate) "It's the social implications that excite me. I visited gardens in Europe before doing my degree. Now I wish I could return to look at all the public spaces."

Nicky Treadwell (lecturer) "We look at spatial design, the boundary between architecture and the environment. It's as much about people as the environment--the spaces where people live their lives...I guess it comes from the 1950s California ethic of inside/outside living."

Rachel Potter (student) "I see it as part of a green network of parks and reserves...it's a great place to teach people about ecological systems."

Heidi Monks "There's something that's urging her on...she calls it 'the interconnectivity of everything' and it underpins all her design work..."

Michael Cassidy (graduate) "He sees...enough wide-open space to swallow thousands of people without pressure. A place to rescue and rehabilitate local plants and wildlife."

I have no doubt that the benign climate and plant diversity of New Zealand will continue to nurture generations of both professional and amateur gardeners. While there will probably always be beautiful, traditional gardens like Maple Glen on the South Island, pictured below, where the English country garden seems to live on (albeit with the tropical touch of free-flying parrots!), there will also, increasingly, be contemporary, subtropical and urban gardens to fulfill the needs and dreams of New Zealand's cultural mix.

Certainly the beautiful Hamilton Gardens represents the wealth of influences available to New Zealand gardeners.

I look forward to seeing evidence of new and traditional influences on my next visit to this wonderful country where even their garden art reflects their sense of humour!

Native Plant Use in NZ Gardens

Resources:
"Gardens of the 1920s and 1930s," L. Beaumont, A History of the Garden in New Zealand, Ed. M. Bradbury, Viking 1995; Fernglen: The Muriel Fisher Story, Fisher & Forde, David Bateman Pub. 2005; New Zealand Gardener, October 1999; Footprints, Department of Conservation newsletter, Nov 2005.

As with other British colonies, the 20th century saw the gradual separation of New Zealand from England. As the children of the first colonists grew up and had children of their own, a unique Kiwi identity increasingly developed.

During the Depression era of the 1930's, the New Zealand school curriculum included gardening so that young New Zealanders could learn about vegetable production and plant propagation. Most of these school gardens included a 'native corner' and "some, following the advice of Leonard Cockayne, a New Zealand botanist of international repute, planted predominantly native species that reflected the original flora of their locality" (Beaumont p. 139). Cockayne was a strong proponent of building 'love of country' via exposure to natural surroundings. In his 1934 publication The Cultivation of New Zealand Plants, he wrote: "By far the most receptive period of life is the school days. To be brought up under beautiful healthy surroundings is assuredly of immense importance in the evolution of a citizen..." (in Beaumont p. 139).

While many of the NZ suburban and corporate landscapes of the twentieth century mimicked the trends and styles of Europe and even the Americas over the years, a small contingent continued to champion the protection and use of native New Zealand vegetation. One such champion was Bill Fisher, original creator of Fernglen, a native plant garden now surrounded by suburbs just north of the city of Auckland.

Fernglen, named after the family home in England, was purchased by the Fisher family in 1888 and consisted of 9 acres of native bush and scrubland. Although the scrubland was cleared for grazing, the native bush was retained and interplanted with more native species. The current garden includes about a 1/2 acre under cultivation, accessed by well-maintained walking paths. The garden at Fernglen, now owned by the Birkenhead City Council, is used for public education and is open to the public. Muriel Fisher, Bill's wife, now in her 90's, and her son Malcolm, still live on the property and assist in both the garden maintenance and the public education programs. We were very fortunate to meet Muriel and Malcolm, and view a video about the creation and importance of Fernglen, as well as tour the garden. As well, I purchased a recently-published book about Muriel's life as a botanist throughout the twentieth century, Fernglen: The Muriel Fisher Story (Fisher & Forde, 2005). The garden is a wonderland of native vegetation and birdlife, and is well worth a visit. Below are some photos taken there in April, 2006.


A protege of the Fishers is NZ landscape architect Nev Arbury, who has landscaped his cottage at Mangawhai Heads in NZ's Northland entirely with native plants. I visited Nev at his cottage and admired his clever use of natives to provide privacy while maintaining his spectacular viewpoint over the ocean. The cottage's hilltop location, exposed site, and only intermittent maintenance (no summer watering) provide many challenges for plants, but the natives have fared far better than more traditional neighbouring plantings. Nev's enthusiasm for and vast knowledge about New Zealand native plants was admirable and most enjoyable. His determination to provide a model for other homeowners, an oasis for migratory birds, and a protected site for endangered plant species is an inspiration. The creation of this garden is chronicled in Appendix V of Muriel Fisher's book.



Another NZ couple who deserve accolades as native plant champions are Arnold and Ruth Dench, of Wellington, NZ. On a mere 1/5 of a steeply rolling acre just east of the Ngauranga Gorge, Arnold and Ruth have created an intensively planted botanical garden of mainly NZ alpine plants. Despite its tiny size, it took us two whole afternoons to tour this complex garden while enjoying Arnold's many fascinating anecdotes. This now elderly couple, also very active in the NZ Alpine Society, have laboured for almost 50 years to establish a multitude of rare and endangered alpine species here. It is daunting to imagine anyone taking it over when they are no longer able to care for it, and I feel especially lucky to have had the opportunity to see it while they are still there. The Denches garden is described in Appendix IV of the book by Muriel Fisher.


The Denches were also kind enough to arrange a special guide for us to the Otari-Wilton's Bush Native Botanic Garden and Forest Reserve, also just outside of Wellington. Olaf, who has been involved with the garden for decades, provided us with an almost overwhelming wealth of information as he walked us briskly through the extensive forest gardens, into the new rock garden and over the new skywalk above the treetops. Alongside the naturally vegetated areas, showier display areas at Otari are designed to show homeowners how natives can be used in residential landscapes. The new flax and cordyline cultivars are astonishing--I wonder how long it will be before they reach North American markets!


Currently, the native plant movement in New Zealand is gathering momentum. As in Canada and the US, where 'the new American garden' celebrates the use of North American natives, New Zealanders are increasingly encouraged to use native plants in order to save water, reduce pesticide and herbicide use, protect the local ecology, and preserve endangered species. National gardening magazines such as New Zealand Gardener frequently feature native plant gardens; books such as Plant Me Instead, a publication by the Department of Conservation that "steers gardeners away from the more than 70 invasive plants that could escape and threaten native flora and encourages them to plant native and non weedy exotics instead" (DOC newsletter, Nov 2005, p.1) are readily available. New Zealanders are learning anew to appreciate their native habitat, and designing gardens to echo them.

Near Waikenae, an hour north of Wellington, we visited the front garden of Maggie Smith, where beach-gathered pumice replaces stones in a rock garden featuring almost all native plants, a low maintenance and beautiful alternative to high-maintenance lawn in an often dry area.

As well, there are more and more subtropical plant nurseries, especially in the warmer far north regions, specializing in unique and unusual subtropicals, including proteas and bromeliads. Near the small town of Matakana, for example, there are at least four such specialty nurseries, which seem to be doing a thriving trade. New Zealanders are recognizing the value of their clear, bright light and warm climate, and beginning to favour a more indigenous look for their gardens, moving further away from the British pastel herbaceous border tradition.


However, as in North America, the 'native nazis' can also be found in New Zealand. While we were in Auckland, a public debate raged in the local newspapers about the city council's decision to cut down Queen Street's historic, healthy liquidambars in favour of native replacements. The uproar that this decision generated brought the native plant movement to the public forum, with some charging that natives were always preferable to exotics, and others just as loudly proclaiming that New Zealand's European heritage was also worth preserving. Emotions ran high and both sides published heated pieces for several weeks. More than 180 people emailed or faxed the newspaper in protest of the plan to chop the trees (New Zealand Herald). In the end, the decision was made to retain the Queen Street liquidambars and even to plant more. In other city locations, however, London plane trees, yellow poplars, claret ashes and liquidambars were to be replaced with native Nikau palms, southern rata and cabbage trees.

As well, we visited one nurserywoman who was quite hostile to the native plant movement. She had spent her career building up her family's alpine plant import business, and feared that an overemphasis on native plants would mean the demise of the exotic plant trade in New Zealand, putting small import nurseries such as her own out of business. While we certainly didn't detect any shortage of traditional gardens in New Zealand during our stay, this businesswoman had experienced a steady decline in her sales as the native plant trend increased. It seems that the native plant movement in New Zealand has its challenges still, on both sides of this trend!