RESTORE NATURE NEWSLETTER

February 2025

Dear Readers,

As you labour in your garden, my heart is with you. Everything is a struggle, if not outright war. So much persistence and energy is needed, and you WILL encounter discouragement, sometimes very strong.

Recently between a seed collecting trip and and visit to the Fynbos restoration nursery down in Muizenberg, I made detour to Kirstenbosch looking for anything I could learn there on insect-plant relationships.

To get to the restio garden, my favourite, one has to climb right up all the stairs and sloping paths to reach the top of the garden. Starting down in the cool shade of the dell it becomes brighter and brighter. I have finally realized why the restio garden is so high up. Glaring sun and a fresh breeze would create the most favourable conditions for a living restio collection.

I'm working on a list of about 100 peninsula butterflies and what plants they eat, based on the books by Steve Woodall on the butterflies of South Africa. Woodall is an amateur lepidopterist, and it is fitting he has written the finest guidebooks on butterflies and moths. His enormous knowledge appears to arise from an obsession with the insects from youth, and fanatical devotion to their collection and study. It is encouraging as it shows there is a place for amateurs in the biodiversity space, and we should not be put off if we come to this interest late in life or by other routes than academia.

Finally after a hot climb I reached the elevation where the tips of the giant restios were touching the bright blue summer sky.

Regarding my list of butterfly foods, I've finished going through one of Woodall's books, writing down the butterfly names with their larval food. It is something necessary. The other resources are just not detailed enough, too brief or to generalized to the whole region. I think this is something everyone living in a very biodiverse area just may have to do for themselves. I've learned from gardeners that even in California with its fantastic level of public engagement there are similar information dynamics of lack of specificity.

I found a mole hill in one of the large lawns and this seems to be the native soil of Kirstenbosch. It looks very rich, from the colour it is clay, but its actually quite gritty and sandy to the touch. Perhaps it is a mix of degraded shale and sandstone.

As said, I'm moving on stage by stage with working on compiling a list of butterfly larva food plants for gardeners in Cape Town. Then I hope to move on to beetles. After that I'll probably have to raise most of the plants myself as you can't find them in nurseries. Nurseries are not going to cultivate hundreds of rather inconscpicuous plants for the sake of butterflies as they are under pressure to make money. It is what it is.

The first thing that I was surprised by in my studies at home was the number of grass and grass like species that are host plants to Lepidoptera larvae. It can definitely be said that a grass garden can go a long way to supporting Lepidopteran biodiversity ! Even the infamous invasive and exotic Kikuyu grass is host to a few speceis. At the Cape we are not in the South African grasslands, but the restios and Cyperaceae are great supporters of Lepidopteran larvae. However, as I walked around the restio garden I didn't see many caterpillars. I wonder why.

Long before my visit to the restio garden I researched on what Restios grew in my neigbourhood on the Cape Flats Sand Fynbos,the potential natural vegetation of my garden. I chose my species carefully. I bought Restio seeds, smoked them and planted them in trays in the right season, but have had no success thus far. I would love to intern with people who have more horticultural knowledge. However, for noe, experimenting and trial and error is the way I'm going to have to go. We need a lot of resourcefulness, because doing this is just not as easy as one may imagine. A lot will get in the way of this most worthwhile of pursuits. Do not imagine there will be people lining the way cheering you on.

As you leave Kirstenbosch you will notice that the visitor's centre which houses the nursery and book shop and some other offices, is thatched with our traditional Cape thatch, made from dried restios ! It is truly appropriate and wonderful.

Topic suggestions welcome

You may write to me anytime at the website greenidiom by filling out a comment. You can also use my webmail (website mail) address greenidi@greenidiom.com.

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