Thursday Tips & Techniques: Guerilla Gardening
You may have heard the term “guerilla gardening” and wondered what it is. In a nutshell, it refers to planting a garden on land that doesn’t belong to whoever is doing the planting without obtaining the permission of the landowner. In fact, these gardens are “squatters” on the land.
Guerilla gardening has been around for thirty years or so but the movement is just now beginning to gain momentum. One might say it’s the original urban community garden since many of the early guerilla gardens were planted on city owned vacant land that later became protected by city parks and recreation departments through community garden programs.
Many guerilla gardeners work under cover of darkness transforming vacant pieces of land–as small as a narrow strip along a fence or an empty planter box or as large as a vacant lot–into green spaces planted with flowers, fruits, and vegetables. Others plant during daylight in an effort to galvanize communities into action. Techniques like seed balls known as seed bombs by members of the guerilla gardening community, are popular because the budgets for these gardens are quite small or even non-existent and fueled only by the vigilant volunteers who believe in their cause.
Guerilla gardening has become a form of political and environmental activism and is especially popular in cities of the UK and Canada.
Recommended reading:
Guerrilla Gardening: How to Create Gorgeous Gardens for Free
Guerrilla Gardening: A Manualfesto