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At the moment, it is better to walk through the forest with your head bowed.
Looking up doesn’t bode well: yellowed leaves, bald spots, dead branches.
Only every fifth tree still has an intact crown, according to the 2020 forest condition survey - an official sample that is carried out every year in Germany.
The heat and drought of recent years are causing problems for the forest, as are storms, forest fires and floods.
Pests spread at lightning speed because they can reproduce extremely well in the long, hot summers.
Climate change is not only leaving its mark on the forest.
Steppe candles instead of hydrangeas, ginkgo instead of maple
Garden owners are also struggling.
What was green and blooming in their beds for years is less and less able to cope with the new climatic conditions.
The gardens will have to be adapted sooner or later - thirsty hydrangeas could replace undemanding steppe candles, soft, robust ginkgo, the susceptible maple trees.
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Garden owners should therefore rethink in good time, says Gabriella Pape, garden architect and founder of the Royal Garden Academy in Berlin-Dahlem.
“Many of them are advocates of native plants.
However, you are badly advised to specialize only in these species. ”Because so-called climatic plants, which cope particularly well with drought, heat and extreme weather phenomena such as storms or heavy rain, mostly come from America, Asia or the Mediterranean region.
North American survivor
A tree like a superhero is, for example, the sweetgum tree (
Liquidambar styraciflua
) from North America.
If you have it in the garden, you don't have to worry about its survival even in the most adverse circumstances.
He endures great heat, but also deep frosts.
It even colonizes high altitudes in Mexico and can survive heavy floods of up to 20 days without any problems.
The tree smells of sweet chewing gum, and it also looks great: its leaves are star-shaped, reminiscent of maple and change color in autumn from yellow-orange to carmine red to black-violet.
Its disadvantage: it may be too big for some garden owners, as it can be over 20 meters high.
An attractive superhero: the sweetgum tree from North America
Source: De Agostini via Getty Images
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The leather sleeve tree (
Gleditsia triacanthos
) from the eastern part of North America is
easier to handle
.
It has light leafless foliage and pod-like fruits (hence its name), grows very slowly and rarely grows taller than twelve meters in Germany.
The bladder ash (
Koelreuteria
) and the black or white mulberry (
Morus nigra and Morus alba
) are also heat- and drought-resistant candidates for smaller gardens.
If you want to plant a Mediterranean flair to match the climate, get a willow-leaved pear
(Pyrus salicifolia)
with narrow silver-gray leaves.
Rethinking: Gabriella Pape hopes for the end of the gravel gardens
Source: Hide.de/Marlene Gawrisch
"There are also a number of rowan berries (
sorbus
) that are very robust," says Gabriella Pape.
The service tree (
Sorbus torminalis
)
is particularly celebrated
.
It is particularly drought and disease resistant, has a beautiful autumn color and good berries - which animals and insects also benefit from.
Long flowering time for insects
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What we plant should ideally also serve the fauna.
It is especially important for insects that they find flowers in the garden for a long time.
"Anyone can flower plants in June, the great art is the five months before and after," says Gabriella Pape.
Since most native perennials have a comparatively short flowering time, they should be mixed with foreign perennials or selections.
Real lavender bears flowers for up to six months - that pleases insects
Source: picture alliance
Savory (
Satureja
), Patagonian
Verbena
(
Verbena bonariensis
) and Real Lavender (
Lavandula
) have flowers for up to six months.
Goldmarie (
Bidens
) blooms from April to autumn and attracts bumblebees, bees and hoverflies.
Prairie plants from North America such as splendor candle (
Gaura lindheimeri
), coneflower (
Echinacea
) or sun bride (
Helenium
) add color to the garden in late summer, when other plants turn brown.
Succulents such as the sedum telephium are particularly hardy
Source: picture alliance / imageBROKER
You can sometimes tell whether plants have coped well with the heat and drought.
For example, some have silver, felty, woolly leaves or thorny branches.
Others - such as roses - have developed particularly extensive roots in order to obtain the necessary water reserves.
The very tough ones in the garden have waxy surfaces and developed thick-fleshed storage organs.
Succulents such as the different species of
sedum
store water and evaporate relatively little.
So they even survive longer periods of drought.
Houseleek (
Sempervivum
)
is practically indestructible, and it is
not without reason that it is also called stone rose.
It also grows where hardly any other plant can withstand it, can withstand heat as well as cold without any problems and keeps its leaves in winter.
Hedges for the microclimate
If you don't just want to plant drought artists in your garden, you can try to keep the microclimate there as moist and cool as possible - even without constantly doing your rounds with the garden hose.
Not only deciduous trees and wild trees such as maple, hornbeam and rock pear cool their surroundings by providing shade and evaporating water.
Hedges and bushes also ensure that the wind and sun do not dry out the soil too much when it is hot.
Since many tree hedges now turn brown themselves in summer, you are well advised to choose drought-resistant plants.
"Butterfly lilac (
Buddleja davidii
) is very adaptable, an insect magnet and can grow up to three meters high," recommends Gabriella Pape.
Or you can try a rather unusual rose plant such as the Scheinkerrie (
Rhodotypos scandens
).
A compost heap not only provides valuable nutrients for the soil, the humus also stores water.
A layer of mulch made from lawn clippings or crop residues protects against drying out.
And if you don't lay your garden as level as possible - as usual - but with small hills and depressions, these bumps protect them from drying out and flooding.
Hill instead of plain
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If possible, sealed surfaces and panels should be avoided altogether.
Not only because the garden can then store less water, but also because every piece of green earth helps a little in the fight against climate change.
Garden owners should not only want their plants to withstand the climate, but also help reduce CO2.
“Looking to the future, we have to garden differently.
I very much hope that the gravel garden will soon die out, ”says Gabriella Pape.
“But even lawns that have to be constantly watered and mowed every two weeks are of no benefit to nature.” The best thing to do is to let it grow out and put flower bulbs in between.
This makes it an ecologically valuable meadow.
Or you can make a perennial bed out of it.
Because who needs an English lawn when it dries up completely every summer?
Sometimes it's better to say goodbye to your ideas - and rethink.
Just how radical that can look can be seen in Florida.
Miami Beach wants to gradually say goodbye to the palm trees typical of the cityscape.
Instead, oaks, ash trees and elms should be planted, which provide better shade and absorb more CO2 than their tropical relatives.
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