Degrees of Nativity

I've just pulled out two native Rosa pisocarpa, or at least that's what I was told they were, because they had taken over the tiny space in the front and were extending their long arms into the pathway of unsuspecting pedestrians. I felt like a traitor. I did leave a much slower growing, very compact Rosa nutkana though.

This experience makes me wonder about purity and native gardening. I'm thinking of replacing the two with a rugosa, which originates in North Asia. In fact, I'm lusting after a rugosa, its scent is heavenly and attracts swarms of bees. I guess I'm not a purist when it comes to native gardening. Perhaps I should change the title of the blog?

I can approach this issue from different angles: if we want to protect the diversity of local ecologies, we have to allow them to thrive and restrict the introduction of harmful foreign species. However, if we want to encourage the evolution of diversity, the introduction of the foreign species allows for mixing. I think it's when we push monoculture, when we suppress native species, promote introduced species, and allow those introduced species to replace the native species that we run into danger. Large agrei-businesses see that they can dominate by heavily marketing a certain aesthetic, and that aesthetic works its way into the common vocabulary so that it seems 'normal'. It's 'normal' that roses no longer smell, that they grow in neat bushes, and that they require a great deal of pesticides in order to thrive.

I guess I'm a liberal gardener - I'm working native plants into the mix but also diversifing with plants that also fit with the natural ecology of my garden (acidic, sandy and boggy soils, soggy winters, mini-droughts during summer).