Q and A- Encouraging Women in Horticulture asked the questions and Emma wrote the answers!

1. What drew you to gardening/horticulture originally?

So many things led me to start street gardening 10 years ago. Little bit of background…I grew up on a beautiful small farm inland from Byron Bay. There I felt myself amongst Nature - Nature was my family. Fast forward a few years - I was living in South Melbourne in my early 30s and had moved through 12 years of Chronic Fatigue Syndrome (an exceedingly isolating disease) where my lack of access to Nature had had a huge impact on me. I then moved into another rental. It had no open ground in the back courtyard but it did have a tiny patch available around the street tree out the front along with an active street gardening community. I was nudged into street gardening through a combination of my own need to get my hands in the soil and connect to the earth and the street gardening culture already present on the street. Once I started on this tiny space I was hooked. The way I saw it back then? I was doing something useful that grounded me AND it was connecting me to the neighbourhood! Because I had a clear role in the street and I was working quietly and caring for a patch that everyone could enjoy, people were drawn in - they were curious….and positive! It not only improved my physical health but also my mental health. The immense power of street gardening hit me over the head like a sledgehammer (a good sledgehammer!) and it was a no-brainer to me to try and do as much of this as possible on all the barren patches to help more people.

2. What pathway did you take to get there?

A very very long and winding one! So many threads, challenges and experiences in my life have led me to where I am. In addition to my answer to questions 1, my education (being home-schooled then going to university at 15) helped me think outside the box and not be afraid of asking questions. Also, my 20+ years of teaching piano and performing is the gift that keeps on giving in many ways too. Though I haven’t had formal hort training, I have worked very very hard training myself. I have had native bee lessons, studied public realm plantings around the world, talked to many many experts and scientists from various fields of expertise, read a lot of research and have been inspired by some of the foremost landscape designers in the world. But perhaps mostly importantly, I put in tens of thousands of hours into doing street gardening. All of this combined with A LOT of mulling helped me turn street gardening into an approach that has helped us shape the design (and now the creation!) of the Melbourne Pollinator Corridor.

3. What obstacles did you encounter along the way?

I love this question! There have been policy challenges, gardening challenges, charity challenges and personal challenges. I’ll pick policy and gardening challenges…..otherwise we’ll be here all day!

Policy challenges

Over about 3 years from 2020- 2022 I led two campaigns against local council. We won them both!! The first was around a small site that we had been, with initial council support, turning into a set of lovely engaging gardens demonstrating the different types of gardens that could be created on patches of barren land. This situation turned and became so bad that there was an external enquiry into what had happened on council’s end. The second campaign was a 10-month-long, municipality-wide campaign to change incoming regressive Nature Strip Guidelines that were preventing any chance of compliant street gardening. Results?The BEE Gardens are still going strong and City of Port Phillip now has a workable reasonable set of Nature Strip Guidelines that benefits both the community and council. I am proud not only of being successful with these campaigns but also with how we won these campaigns: we did The Michelle Obama - “when they go low, you go high”! These campaigns took a massive toll on me (the big one took a couple of years to recover from) but experiencing the immense support from both the community and experts made me even more fiercely determined to scale the power of street gardening and create positive change. When I started out I never in my wildest dreams thought I would encounter so much resistance to obvious, desperately-needed, positive change, particularly by middle-aged white men (of which a large amount have a large say in what happens in a large amount of public realm). Had I known what I was going to be put through, I would definitely have thought twice about trying to create systemic change in public realm!! But now I know that it is because I am a woman, a renter, financially poor, non-corporate and creative that I can stand alongside those who need change and stand up for the change that is needed.

Gardening challenges

I have had most things happen to me out in public realm - I have been chased by an off-the-lead Rottweiler, verbally abused, spat at, physically threatened, harassed, even taken to court. Gardens have been pulled apart. Council contractors have sprayed the gardens with glyphosate. However, 99.9% of the thousands of people I have come across are amazing and it’s important to know that you can never (ever!) please everyone and these sorts of challenges are part of street gardening, which I also call the wild west of gardening!Then there are what I call The Big 6 which are ongoing - litter, weeds, dog poo, dryness trampling and theft. Each one of these challenges could be a fascinating book into the behaviour of people and land!

Final notes on challenges - every challenge I have worked through so far has also presented immense opportunities. Perhaps not at the time I was hoping or from the person I was expecting but they did - every time. Also, the practice I have had at dealing with challenges and set backs means that most just don’t phase me like they used to - it’s not that I am complacent, I just say Bring It On!

4. Who were your mentors?

Everyone should have mentors at every age and stage of their career! I still work with my mentor from the Kenneth Myer Innovation Fellowship Sally Treeby who has been absolutely fantastic, especially in the realms of governance and finance (we can’t create the Melbourne Pollinator Corridor as a sustainable entity without the many behind-the-scenes systems being up-to-date and running smoothly— so very boring but so very important!)! Fiona Brockhoff has also been exceedingly generous with her time, energy and knowledge over the past few years- we always have great conversations and Fiona’s eye, imagination and curiosity combines into something constantly remarkable! I also love learning from people who have created newness, moved the field forward, moved knowledge forward - done something great. Whatever walk of life they are from they share traits like courage, insane dogged determination and the willingness to take risks and go somewhere no one has gone before. These people include Robin Wall Kimmerer, Sir David Attenborough, Ferran Adria, Dame Elisabeth Murdoch, Michael Kieran Harvey, Helena Norberg-Hodge, Piet Oudolf, Professor Nigel Dunnett. What a list! These are people I greatly admire and try to learn from whether I have met them or not (though I have been lucky to have met a few of these amazing humans). I will also add that anyone (especially any woman) who has founded a charity and turned it into a sustainable entity is truly inspiring as they have truly beaten the odds.

5. What are you working on at the moment?

We have just gone through a huge autumn rejuvenation of many of the sites of the Melbourne Pollinator Corridor which included improving water retention and soil health. This was huge and fun and I’m so looking forward to spring where we will be planting a lot of wildflowers. I have also just reconciled all the finances - again, boring but super important for the MPC’s longevity. This week, apart from writing these answers, I have

also been working on:

• 2 consulting pieces

• our end-of-financial-year funding campaign

• our new up-to-date volunteer program

• an exciting volunteer recognition program

• a short newsletter for next week

• 2 grant applications

• 2 diagrams to communicate different aspects of the Melbourne Pollinator Corridor

• different ways we can scale our volunteer pool

• revamping our website in multiple sections eg updating the blog• learning how to measure the impact of different aspects of the MPC clearly to different

groups of people

• making sure our weekly volunteer gardening sessions are prepped for (this week is Port

Melbourne Primary)

• securing funding to reprint my book (which is running out of copies!)

Then there are the things that I am constantly mulling over:

• what’s next for each of the gardens

• where each garden is at for spring/summer

• what sites are next in the MPC

• what we need to do in the gardens to welcome new species

That’s what I can remember - there are most likely some things that are forgotten.

6. What does an average day consist of for you?

I can safely say that there is no average day for me! Because Heartscapes has such a tiny team (of 2), I wear multiple hats on any given day. This is both exceedingly challenging and something I absolutely relish. This year, however, I have aimed to embed a little more routine. Mondays I do my work from Burnley Campus and Fridays is gardening day with the volunteers - both are days I really look forward to! Around this I have my meetings and do my best to complete the never-ending to do list. I am also a single mum to a gorgeous 7-year-old (who inspires me daily to do my best and create a better world for her and her generation) and am still teaching piano (which I really love). So there are 3 routines happening that (mostly!) work together.

7. What is your favourite plant?

I cannot say just one. I have many favourites for different reasons and in different seasons including:

Wahlenbergia species. Blue-purple magnificence. I love the lashings of white pollen that native bees love to bury themselves in.

Senna artimisioides. The form. The pods. The gorgeous winter flowers! The hardiness. All times of the year, I love it.

Xerochrysum viscosum. What a flower. What a colour. Showstopper!

Podelepis jaceoides. This flower is so special. I don’t know why they aren’t everywhere in

all gardens.

Goodenia ovata. So hardy. I love its flexibility with where it can grow- sun, shade, wet, dry.

I love these plants not just because of how they look and how they work with other plants, but also because of the movement they create around them from the native insects and critters that have been evolving alongside them for millennia.Knowing that these plants are creating food and shelter for so many and having the opportunity to watch their lives unfold infront of me makes me feel more joyful, more connected to the earth, more content within myself and more hopeful.

8. Where do you see yourself in 5 years?

I would be so darn proud to be:

• part of a fantastic Heartscapes team of about 5-7 people

• having 70-80% of my hours paid for (currently at 35%)

• able to take a small break occasionally

• managing the gardens with a vehicle that isn’t about to break down all the time

• incorporating some travel to visit incredible projects that have inspired me from a distance for many years eg Knepp Castle and The High Line (honestly, though, with the amount of travel I don’t do, I would be grateful if I could just make it to see some awesome street gardens in North Melbourne!)

As for the Melbourne Pollinator Corridor, in 5 years we hope to have:

• created or almost created 150 of the 200 gardens

• scaled an active volunteer pool of 150-200 (aiming for 250-300)

• developed solid research around biodiversity and/or wellness within the MPC

• rolled out Stage 1 of the MPC online integrated platform, which will share stories of the

different gardens including the land, ecology and human communities.

• launched our online education program in street gardening

There’s definitely about 5 years worth of solid work in there!

9. What are your 3 most worthwhile tips that you can give to women who are

starting out in the horticulture industry?

I’m doing 4…

1- Ask questions. Don’t be afraid to ask lots of questions - to others and of yourself. Questions are so often seen as weakness but asking questions is actually an act of strength and courage. So pfft to people who poo-poo questions - you will have precious answers to work with and build on, they won’t!

2- Stand up for what is right. If you see injustice say/do something. Support other women. It can be scary and you might be taking the bumpy road short term but being brave and acting with integrity will come back to you positively in the long term.

3- Do less talking about doing and more actual doing. The most incredible people in this industry are the ones who are interested and curious in lots of different ideas. They not only love to explore ideas verbally but also get into the messiness of doing them. I should add here that if for some reason you can’t do the doing, then please support the people who are doing the doing however you can!

4- There is always a way to solve a problem. Whether it be broken systems or sustainability issues there. is. always. a. way to solve them. It’s just waiting for the right person. It won’t necessarily be an easy journey (it will challenge values and patience) but it will be a pretty awesome and interesting one! It’s will also be much more fulfilling and exciting to try for something new rather than sit within the status-quo. I say to all of you amazing women (and men of course!) in horticulture - go for it!