What does gardening have to do with desertification? Everything. How we choose to design and plan our environment is the main job for the gardener or landscaper. The specific objective of creating a pleasant environment using natural elements of plants, stone, gravel and dirt. We can look at history and see the results of a certain type of gardening based on designs that are quite intellectual and referential. All through the Mediterranean, Turkey, the Middle East, and even Mexico under the influences of the Mayans. one can see the effects of cutting down trees and spreading the gravel and leveling the land to create safe and neat places

The creation of great temples and buildings at the expense of the environment has been a historic problem. Mayan deforestation. I have heard a hypothesis that the Mayan civilization collapsed due to burning the forest to make the lime necessary to stucco all the buildings and temples in the great cities. A certain type of aesthetic that our modern culture still participates in

This is a human metaphysical condition that we are dealing with. How does man define himself in nature? Why do we so need to alter the natural world so much so that we are comfortable. Delimiting the yard creating borders and divisions that are clearly demarcated. The idea of clean lines and neatness instead of a constellation of causes and complex systems with multiple layers of interaction.

Greek deforestation

French deforestation The source of the elaborate geometric linear tradition in the garden. Versailles

Versailles the garden of kings and peasants. A garden that was created to be referenced from one vantage point, the kings veranda. Thousand of peasants referenced the garden from behind a shovel and in the ditch.

Desertification starts at home