East Finchley needs help!

[Elizabeth Barile]

Hello fellow green thumbs,

I am writing to ask for both advice and community support for a new project.

Tomorrow I am moving into a new flat in East Finchley. It is actually just down the road from where I live now so I am very familiar with the area as I have lived here for over two years already. Just outside the new property is a neglected public planter. It looks like a scraggly monster of over grown fuschia with what I believe is a tree struggling to grown through the middle.

I would love to start with this planter which is easily maintainable for me, as it is just outside my new door, and then branch out to other forgotten public planters in East Finchley.

I have the enthusiasm and some tools as I am a keen gardener in my own space. What I am missing is fellow gardeners with guerrilla experience. Enhancing this planter will make a great statement as it is along the busy foot path which runs parallel to the high road and down to the station.

Please let me know if there are any local green thumbs , or those happy to travel north, who can help me with at least some advice about how to make this a green growing success.


Best,

Liz

[mic]

Hi there, I just seen your post, I wish I had seen it earlier as you could have put in some green manures in over winter to fix some nitrogen and prepare the soil for spring.  I would continue on this theme though as we are very much approaching winter.  You could cut back the Fuchia and use it cover the soil as mulch as it breaks down over winter.  A branch at time as you walk past every couple of days mean the change to the enviroment is slow and people stuck in the grind won't even notice what is happening around them.  Given there are still quite a few leaves around from the London Plane (Platanus Hispanicus I think?) trees include them in the mulch as well so you have some nice leaf mould happening, some veggie scraps, some Nettle ferterlizer and you should have some good quality forest like soil ready for spring. Pump up the jam as Technotronic said in 89, jam/soil same thing yeah.   I am in Holloway which is not the otherside of the world if you need some help.

mic