Weeds are weed control
I write this at my allotment, watching nature do its best in challenging conditions and the dog openly curse at the flies.
It has not been a productive year. The drought means that, out of the many, many seeds I planted, I have one sweet potato, two squashes and three healthy potato plants. The fruit has been glorious and mostly eaten by hungry birds.
I think back to my stubborn grandad—from the football blog—who worked as a gardener on the Murthly Estate for decades. He oversaw nature with a patience otherwise reserved for my gran, games of draughts and trapping earwigs in clay pots filled with straw to keep them off his prize-winning dahlias.
I wonder what he would have made of my attempts at this plot. I know I have made my neighbours and the council squint in confusion at the ‘weeds are weed control’ management system.
I love to sit in silence, drinking tea from the tin cup that lives on the fence post just above the water tap, and simply be. The birds feast on seeds scattered by my careful chopping of the wilderness as I try—and fail—to find the no-dig potato plants. I did find the pumpkins. They are looking very poorly.
There are cats skulking around hunting mice, a white rabbit helping itself to a neighbour’s cabbages, bees and butterflies visiting the flowers, and a baby toad moving through the grass.
In the end, I think he would have understood the need to protect the soil and the wildlife that keeps this place alive. It is their home; I am only its temporary custodian.
I feel the same way about the maps. I am not trying to replace what they were. I am reimagining them, keeping their history alive through the stories and memories of each new viewer.
