Today, it was Open Garden Day in Augsburg. I visited private gardens and enjoyed seeing what others do and think about their gardens, gardening in general, the climate…Everyone I spoke to is thinking of a future of water and energy shortages and how to adapt their garden to survive with less water (no, nobody mentioned planting cacti!) and energy.

Back home, looking through the photos I took, I see mainly sheep and hens! And the City Farm Augsburg, one of the participating gardens, and the one I enjoyed the most. What a fantastic collection of plants, herbs, vegetables, weeds, animals, all growing happily together! Ildi, our guide and co-leader of the project (the other co- being Bennie, her husband) presented the garden project and their efforts to make it self-sufficient. The farm has neither water nor electricity. They collect rainwater for all their watering needs!

And the best part: for the last month, I had been looking for a comfrey plant for my garden. None of the garden centers I went to stocked it. Some didn’t even know of it, or thought of it as a weed. But here in the City Farm, it was flourishing, growing masses of flowers. When I declared my interest, Ildi dug out two plants, one flowering blue and the other purple, for me!

https://cityfarmaugsburg.wordpress.com/about/ the garden seems to have grown since the video.

What a good day it was!