Harringay, Haringey - So Good they Spelt it Twice!
Sunflower killer at large!
Tags for Forum Posts: garden theft, garden theft/damage, plant theft
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by Liz on
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Sorry to hear that Alice. It's a real problem. Last year I lovingly tended two giant sunflowers in my front garden only for someone to pull their heads off and leave them 50 yards up the road. It's really upsetting. The sunflowers in Pemberton Road have been vandalised too. There are some very weird people around. I mean, just what pleasure can there be in destroying flowers?
In this discussion here, we've been talking about the vandalism and theft of flowers. With so few people using their front gardens as anything other than a wheelie bin storage space, it seems a shame that those trying to brighten the place up are treated like this. Don't lose heart though. I just prevented a woman from wrenching the flower off a street dahlia and damaging the plant, I got a mouthful for my trouble but hey ho, maybe she won't come back...or maybe she'll come back later and 'prune' my sunflowers too (that was her excuse)
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Permalink Reply by Alice Mezzo on
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Liz! Thanks for your reply. A terrible thing happened to my garden today! I am sad to hear about the Pemberton sunflowers. I've decided the only thing to do do is to plant 10 more flowers in the place of the one that was lost in my garden. Well done for standing up to the dahlia wrencher; keep fighting the flower fight! It's definitely worth it. I am made very happy at the sight of any much-loved flowers in Harringay.
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Permalink Reply by Alison P on
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Go Liz, go Alice! It is so sad that people do this, but let's just keep at it.
I do wonder whether plants with large flowers are just too risky, too attractive to the odd idiot, so maybe its worth thinking about what we choose to plant in very public sites like these, and maybe go for things that are a little less showy and distinctive. Which is such a shame, particularly with sunflowers because they are just so amazing to watch them grow, almost on a daily basis.
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Permalink Reply by Justin Guest on
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Yeh. We are a bit gutted about the ones taken from our beds in Pemberton- especially as they had the potential to be huge (I got the seeds from the most enormous sunflowers I have ever seen), and the heads were quite immature when taken. More than that, to get them the muppet taking the flower has to rip most of the top third of the plant down to reach the head, and this has multiple juvenile heads on it that will now likely suffer too.
There is one a few days old now, let’s see how long it survives. I would love to catch them in the act.
I am currently growing a bunch of lavender from seed, this might be a bit less nickable for next year I think.
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Yes, I've been wondering about lavender too - okay, so people will take flowers here and there but its hard to do the same damage as we're talking about here. And they're okay with a bit of neglect ..
(I think the Pemberton beds look fantastic all the same Justin).
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Permalink Reply by h4k on
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Lavender from seed ! Doesn't it take forever to get to any size ?
I love lavender and used to have fantastic lavender hedge to my front door (all of about 3 foot, but I adored it). Inevitably it got too leggy eventually and I overpruned ... Not been able to get it going again as the hedge is bigger these days so although I have repeatedly replanted I have always lost the plants, not enough light now I think.
The lavender in Chestnuts Park playground has been good and stood up to a fair bit of rough treatment so probably a great option for guerilla gardening.
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Believe it or not, we had lavender nicked from our beds. It was small enough to dig out so someone did. We've had more success with other herbs and they do flower but I quite like big brash flowers, not subtle ones. However, as Alison says, these seem to be the ones that attract the vandals. The mallow is big and can withstand being in the street, nasturtiums don't seem to attract too much negative attention and when planted in great numbers make a good show. Petunias, busy lizzies and geraniums are largely untouched too.
Justin, how about putting a little notice up saying that the sunflowers were grown by the nursery school (well a few of them were), maybe the guilt factor could help? I'm contemplating a little sign that just says something like "Many of our plants are grown or planted by local children" (also true) and hope people feel bad about nicking them.
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Actually no idea how long the lavender will take to grow if I am honest. Never done it before. So let's see... I have thought about putting a sign up, and probably will actually, but I figured that who ever is doing this (1) might not care (2) based on a discussion you and I had Liz may not even speak English so well as to understand if they cared, and (3) it might actually draw unwanted attention.
All very negative, so, thinking positive I will put a sign up! Lets see.
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I know what you mean, but a discreet sign at soil level that doesn't say anything about damage or theft but is couched in positive terms and just mentions who grew the flowers might work. People do still think I'm a council gardener even when I'm gardening in my slippers and my kids are running about, so there's no harm in letting people know who's doing the work. Might make them feel more 'possessive'. I'm pleasantly surprised how many people look out for the flowers and get as cross as I do about negative behaviour...and the dahlia wrencher I caught yesterday spoke excellent English so its worth a punt at appealing to their consciences.
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On looking at this post again, there is something that is sort of implicit but not actually stated anywhere (apologies if it is and I missed it). Which is that the flowers that get the most ruined when they are vandalised or nicked are often the ones that work best as cut flowers, particularly those that look lovely on single stems. I guess either because that is what people are doing with them (putting them in vases) or because they are just showy and gorgeous and attract the attention of the idiots who like to demolish things.
So for the public space planters (and maybe those of us having problems with our front gardens) we should think about making sure we include some flowers that are lovely but that aren't ruined if someone picks a few or snaps a stem.
On that front, and having not grown them for years, I've been really taken with nastursums this year - fantastic colour and so many stems and flowers. If one gets cut it really isn't much of a problem. Lavender ditto.
Petunias and buzy lizzies are other examples (though if I'm honest I'm not a huge fan of either). What others are there? Perennial geraniums? Perennial wallflowers? I've also had a huge amount of colour in the past from both.
Any other ideas?
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I agree.
For this reason, I think, that's why large daffs were stripped out of the planters but small ones or tulips (which fall apart when picked) were largely untouched in the springtime. I'm trying not to kill some Love-Lies-Bleeding that Geoff gave me that may be suitable?
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Permalink Reply by StephenBln on
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I'm sure if the signs weren't successful, the council wouldn't put up with them..
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Don't you think signs written / painted by kids might have more effect?
1. It's clear then that this isn't a council garden
2. Some people might be more reserved when it comes to knicking from a kid's garden
The G/Gs in the area I used to live in - used kids signs like this:
In fact the kids really did do a lot of the work:
Other areas have problems with speeding and often use schools to paint signs: