I am saving the world through my flower garden —a daunting task, but I embrace it willingly, especially when my Save the World Gardening Instruction Manual reads like this:
Rule 1: Do nothing.
Rule 2: See Rule 1.
So lately I’ve been leaving my garden alone as much as I can. You might say I’m idling my fingers to the metaphorical bone, all in the name of saving the world.
You’re welcome.
So how am I saving the world with my garden? I’ll explain, but first a little history:
For the record, the garden belonged to my wife, who started it in 2004 and tended it with loving, laborious care—feeding, weeding, watering, and worrying in the most hands-on way you can imagine. Under her constant care, her garden was spectacular, the envy of true gardeners everywhere.
When she died of stroke in 2018 her garden passed to me, but because I wouldn’t know a weed from a watermelon, I have taken a different path when it comes to the garden’s care. Oh, the perennials are still spectacular in her absence, but true garden lovers would probably gasp in some less-approving way if they were to see it now.
That’s because I’m using the garden to save the world, and that first rule of my Save the World Gardening Instruction Manual commands me to “Do nothing.” Oh, I’ll pull a weed now and then, if I can figure out which thing is a weed and which is a flower. But still, some of those weeds are pretty darn attractive too, so “Rule 1” it is, most of the time.
True gardeners might also gasp when they gaze at my prize-winning collection of dry, dead stems and stalks all over the garden. Most gardeners tidy up the greenery by “dead-heading” spent blooms. My wife did, endlessly, until her fingers bled.
But not me, because I’m trying to save the world.
See, once the columbines and cone flowers have finished blooming, I leave them up to dry for the goldfinches to enjoy the seeds. Go ahead, ask the finches who they thank for saving their world. They’ll tell you.
And because the finches drop more seeds than they eat, next year’s garden will have all the more columbines and cone flowers — plants that I didn’t have to burn gas on the way to Platt Hill to get. Thank you, Rule 1.
And then there are all those milkweeds that keep sprouting among my wife’s irises and lilies. I never planted them. They just came up on their own because…well, because they’re weeds, and that’s what weeds do. I don’t water or feed them (see Rule 1), and they seem to do just fine all on their own.
Even though they’re a weed, I leave them alone because monarch butterflies depend upon them, and monarchs are declining all over the world. It feels good to know that I am saving the world’s monarchs by a grueling hands-off adherence to Rule 1 of the Manual.
Recently, though, I noticed a gaggle of red beetles clustered among the blossoms of my milkweed plants. “Hm-m-m,” I said. “I wonder what those things are.”
Mama Google says my milkweed’s red beetles are “red milkweed beetles.” (If I ever meet the guy who came up with that bug’s name, I’d like to buy him a beer.) So: Welcome to the neighborhood, red milkweed beetle. Your world just got a little bigger, thanks to my milkweedy idle-hands garden. You’re welcome.
But wait, are red milkweed beetles harmful?
Mama Google says the red milkweed beetle is in the family Cerambycidae (the guy who came up with that name can buy his own damn beer), and it won’t bite me or bother the peonies, lilies, clematises, or irises, because it feeds exclusively on milkweed. In fact, some consider it a beneficial garden insect, because its feeding may deform the plant’s blossom, making it difficult for the milkweed to re-seed itself.
Hands-off weed control, thanks to Rule 1 of my Save the World Gardening Instruction Manual.
But wait, this is getting complicated. Here I am saving the monarchs’ world by leaving milkweeds alone, and that opened the door for red milkweed beetle immigration, but this beetle’s dining habits could potentially limit next year’s milkweed crop? Should I eliminate these beetles to save future monarchs?
I checked the Manual and decided I owed it to the world to continue doing nothing. (I also poured myself a Jameson’s, which isn’t explicitly in the rule book, but I’m pretty good at reading between the lines.)
After all, if the monarch gang has a beef with the beetle gang, let them handle it Sharks-and-Jets style. They both already sport those striking colors, and how cool would it be to see them tangle in a proper moonlight rumble?
I’m pretty sure I know which path my wife would have taken, but she’s not here to ask. So I’ve got to go with my gut—and with my Save the World Gardening Instruction Manual.
In any case, “Do nothing” sounds a lot better to me than “Dig out your garden gloves and snap to it.”
Besides, saving the world can be thirsty work, and that whiskey ain’t gonna drink itself.
TR Kerth is the author of the book “Revenge of the Sardines.” Contact him at trkerth@yahoo.com.
