Any 'guerilla gardeners' on here?

[Herbsandveg]

Just wondering whether there might be any 'guerrilla gardeners' out there...

For the uninitiated these are folks who take it on themselves to sow seeds and plant plants in and on any available bit of space they catch a sight of in an attempt to 'green up' the world and make it a slightly better place for us all to live in...

A quick search on Amazon will reveal all manner of books on this, and there are various websites and ad-hoc groups around for anyone interested.

Would be really interested to discuss this subject further if anyone was interested in doing so...

[Darwin.]

I've got 27 trees, a lot of bushes, a good few shrubs and a beech hedge surrounding an acre of ground. I have the greenhouse and pollytunel too. I do it partly to green up as you say and partly because I love trees, plants and nature in general.

There's still a lot of space I won't plant in though so I don't think I count as one of those.

Oh, I almost forgot to mention my 35 house plants.

[veggiechicken]

Some of us have signed up to International Sunflower Guerrilla Gardening day on May 1st.
The Guerrilla Gardening Home Page
There's a lot of it going on - but we don't often talk about it as then we wouldn't be guerrillas

[zazen999]

I'm a dab hand at making seed bombs but don't like to talk about the rest in public

[Jardiniere]

dont know if it counts but theres a tiny bit of land that i have to walk across to get to my piece of land and i think it might belong to the commune (the village council) but it was always just left to do nothing so I incorporated it into my patch ....have put in michaelmas daisies, hypericum, hollyhocks, iris as permanent planting (but could dig them out if I needed to) and the rest I grow annual veg - theres some purple sprouting broccoli there at the moment .However it wont have made any difference to the local environment which is totally green countryside anyaway!
Also there a patch next to my house which belongs to the department (county council) it used to have a little brick shed on it where they stored road salt etc but they demolished it 18 months ago and have just left the space empty. I've fenced it (cos otherwise you could walk straight into my back garden)with a fence made from pallets but the soil is awful (because a shed was demolished on it?) and I dont know whether to try to cultivate it or not....letting the weeds grow right now ...the commune might purloin it for dustbins (we have communal dustbins here) but if you have any ideas about a crop that could go on it and wouldnt matter if it was lost - its a small piece of land - 12 foot by 14 perhaps? and on a slope...

[julesapple]

Just wondering whether there might be any 'guerrilla gardeners' out there...

Well, there's Big Mally.......

I'm planning to do the opposite to guerilla gardening. I want to go and - ahem - acquire some plants. Rescue might be a better word. They're growing on what is, at present, a verge. A couple of years ago some contractors installed the gubbings, right next to them, for a pedestrian crossing. It appeared to cross the road to nowhere - no buildings, no path, just fields where the beach donkeys hang out when off duty. The council said 'Planning permissions? Building things? Nooooooo. Of course not' Well, guess what? They're shoving in an industrial estate........

So, shortly, I'm guessing the flowers will be tarmacadam. That's where my spade and I come in....

[VirginVegGrower]

I'm a dab hand at making seed bombs but don't like to talk about the rest in public

Some even scatter over here

[Herbsandveg]

All,

Thanks for entering in to the slightly 'subversive' nature of my original post - and also for the link to the website. It's one I already knew about, but haven't been on for a while so I'll get back on there now and get involved in what they're doing.

It's really good to learn that there are a few kindred spirits about when it comes to this kind of thinking, and especially good to know that this kind if Forum is big enough and eclectic enough to cater for many different expressions of our interest in gardening. I suppose we're a bit like the SAS in that the last people to talk about being really true 'guerrilla gardeners' are actually the most subversive on the quiet...

[out in the cold]

I would tell you.

But then I would have to tie you to a tree and kill you

[Herbsandveg]

I would tell you.

But then I would have to tie you to a tree and kill you

Ha ha! My niece once went out with a lad who kept trying to tell me he'd been in the SAS. He said he'd been shot three times (all on separate occasions) and said he'd done three tours of duty in Ireland. Strange, however, that he couldn't remember any real or factual details about Ulster when pressed, and the conversation became quite hilarious one night when he tried to tell me he'd "been on patrol one night in Temple Bar", which must have mysteriously and miraculously teleported from Dublin just for that one night for the purposes of his fantasies!...

[Newton]

We live near West Kirby. They are a transition town. There are about 30 locations around town where the incredible edible group plant out veggies for the public to consume. Everywhere from pavement planters to railway station planters.......bits of ground here and there....

All varieties are grown and you just help yourself when ready. Great idea........

[Herbsandveg]

We live near West Kirby. They are a transition town. There are about 30 locations around town where the incredible edible group plant out veggies for the public to consume. Everywhere from pavement planters to railway station planters.......bits of ground here and there....

All varieties are grown and you just help yourself when ready. Great idea........

Fantastic! Wish it was like that here! Even with an abundance of green space around us it seems there's a lack of will, or any spark of inventiveness in the local population. The local Morrisons have started stocking all manner of strange looking 'foreign' veg almost none of which has, I'd guess, a chance of becoming a 'good seller'. It seems hard enough trying to tear people away from the plethora of fast food joints in our apparently thriving township, so to get them to take something exotic away themselves and actually cook it themselves is probably asking a bit too much just at this time (Heck, I'm in 'high grump' mode this morning! Sorry, folks. I'll try to be all warm and nice and cuddly in a minute)...

[VirginVegGrower]

That's not what I saw when we were up in Guiseley. That M was heaving with folks picking up the exotica. I couldn't believe it was such a fantastic M.

[Herbsandveg]

That's not what I saw when we were up in Guiseley. That M was heaving with folks picking up the exotica. I couldn't believe it was such a fantastic M.

Sorry about that, but I'm more than happy to admit my grumpy error and can only assume that I read it all wrong. I'll now go down to Morris and buy some as a formal penance...

[Kirk]

Not really around where I live as the local council or whatever have basically put wild flower seeds on any and every available bit of ground. Had a few new roads put in and all the sides, verges and embankments are literally full of wild flowers. They have also done the same on roundabouts that are grass surfaced. Also they let them die back after flowering to self seed. Hell you would almost think someone knew what they were doing.

Suppose that the bee population are happy, weighed down but happy.

If I travel to the south west to visit friends I have a habit of taking a few apples to munch and planting the pips at some of the layby's I take a break at. May take a few lemon pips the next time I head down that way.