By Rita Kainulainen
Ambra Edwards is an award-winning author who has created a career based on her love for gardens and the stories behind them. Edwards has written books on garden history as well as articles for newspapers such as The Guardian and The Daily Telegraph. Her works include, for example, Head Gardeners, The Story of the English Garden and The Plant-Hunter’s Atlas. On October the 4th, the audience at Café Scientifique at Tampereen lyseon lukio had the honour to listen to a presentation delivered by Edwards. Thanks to the cooperation with the Finnish British Society, she had arrived in Finland to attend this specific event. The topic of her presentation was the history of plant collection, botanical research and the development of gardens throughout the centuries.
Bear attacks, starvation, and massacres – all for the sake of seeds
Have you ever paused to think where the flower on your backyard come from? The story behind a plant might be more complex than you could imagine. Botanical history is full of surprises and peculiar incidents. Certain plants, common to modern gardens, can be enjoyed due to the expeditions of botanists from previous centuries. These trips were particularly challenging due to extreme natural conditions and the lack of equipment, including modern navigational tools. Altitude sickness, mosquitoes and smothering heat did not make these trips any easier. Expeditions to acquire different plants have stretched across the globe, all the way from from the rainforests of Borneo to the mountains of Tibet and Chile. Many botanists even lost their lives while trying to find or protect individual seeds.
Orchid bees, nut trees and agoutis
Plant hunters are not the only ones facing challenges. Plants themselves can require a variety of elements in order to grow and thrive. You might wonder what bees, nut trees and agoutis have in common. The Brazil nut tree can be found from the Amazon rain forest, and it can live more than 500 years. Plants are often parts of complex ecosystems that people don’t even think about, and this particular species is a model example of that. Brazil nuts are a familiar Christmas treat for many Brits, but they are rather expensive. The reason behind the high price can be found from the developmental process of these nuts: The flowers of the Brazil nut tree can only be pollinated by a few species of bees, and the maturation of the nuts takes more than a year. In addition to this, the trees are also dependent on another animal when it comes to reproduction. Agoutis, which are small species of mammals, gnaw open the hard capsule surrounding the seeds. The animals then proceed to eat the seeds, but some of them end up buried in the surrounding soil. These buried seeds then, under the right circumstances, grow into new trees. The plant world is full of other species living in interdependency as well.
Plant hunting and gardens today
As Edwards said it, people are no longer climbing Mount Everest in tweeds. Advances in technology have assisted plant collection, making trips safer and more efficient. In the early stages, plants were collected purely for their monetary value: rare flowers acted as symbols of power, fortune and superiority. It was only later when people realised that plants are valuable in many other ways as well. Not only do they have significant scientific value, the intrinsic value of plants should not be underestimated. Today, gardening is no longer an instrument of power but something more. Gardens, as Edwards says, are a form of art. They are not just collections of plant material; they are a space capable of metamorphosis unlike anything else. Gardens bring joy to people, and they offer endless possibilities.
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