Roofs & Rambles

Spent a lovely hour on a garage green roof at the home of Dr. G.Kadas’ garage green roof, my good friend who is one of the world’s leading green roof and invertebrate biodiversity researcher. A lovely hour as today felt like the first day of spring.

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Both Dr Kadas and I have been planted bulbs on many of our green roofs in London, as last year we noticed that a number of sand bees were using the bulbs as navigation beacons to their nests. Crocii and dwarf iris were all in full bloom, though the dwarf daffodils and tulips were still to raise their colourful heads to the sun and the spring skies. Although I only managed to get a picture of a hoverfly lingering on a crocus, a queen bumblebee and a wasp visited the roof while I sat there enjoying the Spring sunshine. The roof was built following the e-guide I wrote with John Little. The pleasure of green roofs is that from now until September they will change, moving from bulbs to wildflowers, form wildflowers to dry grasslands as is the want of vegetation in a temperate clime. The sedums on the roof, that I collected from a beach in Kent are thriving and spreading. They will be in full bloom in June, but before that the wildflowers should herald May with their heads. Soon Dr. Kadas will have a beehive in the garden and the roof will become a miniature feeding ground, helping to produce Honey from a small garden plot in Golders Green in the London Borough of Barnet.