Environmental

Hurstpierpoint's very own Blue Peter garden

By Mike Thatcher

Hurstpierpoint’s Juliet Sargeant has designed the new Blue Peter Garden, which will be unveiled at the Chelsea Flower Show in May. It will then be transferred up to Bridgewater in Salford, once the flowers are quarantined and will be replanted in the autumn.

“It’s very exciting,” said Juliet, whose offices are in the High Street. “Every one of my age watched Blue Peter and grew up with John Noakes and Shep, and of course, Percy Thrower’s garden. This is definitely a once in a lifetime opportunity.”

The regular Hurst Life columnist has been working on it for a year and Blue Peter have been filming the making of the garden, so expect to see her on your screens in the upcoming months. The first Blue Peter Garden, designed by Percy Thrower in 1974, with a sunken pond and statue of Petra, was relocated from Television Centre to Media City in 2012. Blue Peter presenter Mwaksy will be joined by Henry the dog to officially open the garden on Press Day, Monday 23rd May. “I was contacted and allowed to choose any theme I wanted. I didn’t want to do a typical children’s garden with swings and primary colours. I wanted to make it a semi-serious garden as I sense a seriousness about young people these days, who perhaps feel the weight of the mess we’ve made of the world. I wanted to do something environmental; but they know about carbon and climate change, but they don’t know about soil.” Her challenge was to bring to life the subject of soil and to open the eyes of children and adults to soil’s central role in supporting life and its potential to lock-in carbon. Juliet has personal experience from Tanzania in East Africa of the devastating effects of soil degradation and so grasped this opportunity to bring the message of the importance of soil to children’s attention.

“I thought the way to approach it was through creativity and art. I see the garden as sitting between the junction of art and science, so I’m hoping that by making it fun, colourful and creative, it will peak the childrens’ interest to ask questions about soil.” She wanted to make sure it wasn’t a teaching garden and has avoided having information boards everywhere, so that no one feels they have to absorb lots of information or feel preached at.

Juliet trained initially as a medical doctor and has long advocated the importance of gardens for health and in her private practice; she uses gardens to help connect people to the landscape and nature. In 2017 Juliet was made a Fellow of the SGD for her contribution to garden design & horticulture and in 2019 she was made Fellow of The Landscape Institute. She was also one of the Evening Standard’s Progress 100 influential people. In 2018 she was named as one of the BBC 100 Women.

Lounge Lockdown Talks by HKD Transition

Local environmental group HKD Transition have put together a range of talks taking place during the Coronavirus lockdown, that anyone can join in on. They are ‘inform and entertain you during the pandemic when we (HKD) are not able to hold all the activities we had planned’.

The first is on Wednesday (22nd April, 7pm) when Laurie Jackson will talk about climate change and wildlife.

Click images below to go to Event Brite to register for each event.

Climate Change & Wildlife, 22nd April at 7pm

Climate Change & Wildlife, 22nd April at 7pm

Recycling during the pandemic - 6th May, 7pm

Recycling during the pandemic - 6th May, 7pm

Herbs and your health - 29th April, 7pm

Herbs and your health - 29th April, 7pm

Compostable bags; not compostable at home

RECYCLE THIS...

Colin McFarlin is a Volunteer Waste Prevention Advisor with WSCC.

Thank you for all your individual enquiries about your recycling. By the time you read this I will have replied individually to all your emails to the Editor on recycling. Do keep the questions coming...

Compostable bag - Not taken in garden waste

Compostable bag - Not taken in garden waste

Compostable bags

My mailbag has been busy this month with correspondence from readers who have received mail through the post in ‘Compostable Bags’.

With the outcry against plastic many organisations, such as National Trust and WI, have quickly moved away from plastic wrappers for their mailings and moved to biodegradable wrappers.

The information they put on the wrapper is not
accurate. They suggest putting them into your
home compost bin. However, not everyone has
a home compost bin, also they will not compost in a home compost bin as your bin will not reach a sufficient temperature for the wrapper to break own. There are going to be lots of disappointed National Trust and WI members emptying their compost bins in a year’s time and finding this wrapper intact! Councils will not accept this in their garden waste bin, and we, along with many other councils do not have a food waste collection service.

So where can you put it? You are left with your black top rubbish bin.

This new idea is in fact a lot worse than the original plastic wrapper; that can be recycled in major supermarkets with plastic carrier bags.

Put it in your black top rubbish bin and I do hope you will write to anyone who sends you correspondence in a Compostable Bag and point out the problems they are causing in West Sussex - and other counties!

Would you like me to give a talk to your local group on recycling? Do you have an individual question on specific items you are not sure how to recycle? One email to the Editor at editor@hurstlife.co.uk, with a picture if possible, and I can let you know.

Looking forward to hearing from you. Keep recycling!