A busy time for the garden and the area. Last week we had Forest Gate Festival, this weekend is Forest Gayte Pride, on top of the election and the football. And the garden hosted a performance of Much Ado About Nothing on Friday evening, to a full house of 60, some on the ground picnicking and others seated.
East London Shakespeare Festival brought us this performance on a fine summer evening, though it got chillier as the sun went down. We had hired a generator, the size of a fridge, to power the lighting and music, keeping it as far back as the pond, to lessen its growl for the audience.
Much Ado is set in the Messina, where the Prince of Aragon (Don Pedro) is an honoured guest with his entourage. The play is essentially the tale of two couples. Claudio and Hero are soon to be married but Don John, the Prince’s brother plans to thwart it. That melodramatic plot runs through, but the play is best known for the tale of Benedick and Beatrice. Each time, they meet the pair have a sparing match of insults. The Prince thinks this hides amorous possibilities and plots how to get them together, by letting each overhear that the other is wildly in love with them.
The play was energetic and joyous, fitting our space magnificently. It was in modern dress with modern songs interspersed but the language was Shakespeare. A comedy, a farce, where love goes awry, but all goes well in the end. A very enjoyable evening, playing from light into twilight.
We were at Forest Gate Festival on on July 6th. A gazebo was essential, as it rained on and off all day. We were in the play area, near the main stage. There, our pedal cycle blew bubbles, while children decorated pendants made from circular wood slices, and we sold plants. The chairs in front of the main stage belonged to the festival but for the rest of the year are kept at the garden, where we make good use of them. Recently, we have needed them at the well-attended ukulele workshops on Sunday mornings and for Much Ado.
We had a complaint about our use of fake grass in the garden. We invited the complainant to our meeting at the end June. She informed us that plastic grass sheds microplastics and there is a cancer risk from chemical residues used in manufacturing. She pointed out that fake grass is going to be banned in the Netherlands.
Fake grass is difficult to recycle as it is a composite product containing such materials as polypropylene and nylon as well as colourants and chemicals to assist processing. At the meeting, our volunteers were in favour of gradually getting rid of the artificial grass. The first step is to make sure that we use no more of it. How we get rid of it needs research. Though, we could double up areas, that is two layers of fake grass, as a way of storing it in the meantime.
The garden is very green (not counting plastic grass). All the rain we have had over spring and summer has increased chlorophyll in the leaves, the green pigment that works with sunlight and water to make glucose, giving plants sustenance to grow, and to make yet more greenery. In a drought, the absence of water kills off chlorophyll, unless there’s regular hosing. Though, there’s nothing to beat a good downpour when it comes to giving the ground a real soaking.
All our fruit is coming on well. I note apples, pears and plums, and under the small pergola bunches of tiny grapes. We have planted out some of the tomato plants that were getting too big for their pots, so we’ll have some in late summer to add to our sandwiches.
The wildflower bed is past its best, and foxes have given it a trampling. But we still have wild carrot, corn marigolds, hedge mustard and scentless mayweed. Around the garden, hollyhocks are out, mostly yellows but some pink too. The geums in the Fothergill bed are still flowering after over a month. Parakeets squawk from the flats nearby and come to our feeders. They can be considered an invasive species, originally from Africa, but released by careless bird owners, including Jimi Hendrix, who released a pair in the 1960s on Carnaby Street, aptly named Adam and Eve, but many others must have done the same as the birds are now all over the UK. Either way, like grey squirrels, we are stuck with them. One might consider, how long it takes for an invasive species to be accepted as native. Of course, that depends on the harm it does. Japanese knotweed, to take one of many examples, will never be welcome.