My position is very clear: to learn about Mediterranean ornamental horticulture we should not have to go to Pepinieres Filippi but the the Botanical Gardens in Barcelona, since it was created to change the use of North European plants for Mediterranean species.

We all know the efficiency of the technicians and directives in the Mancomunitat de Municipis de l’Àrea Metropolitana de Barcelona (entity paying the maintenance of the gardens). If somebody does not know her, Nuria Membrives, director, has an excellent background in botanical gardens issues. Therefore, my critics are not addressed to the technical staff but to the scientific and political aims of the gardens.

The Botanical Gardens emerged from the project sold to the European community: to gather in a recycled rubbish dump species from the Mediterranean climate areas in the world in order to enrich our ornamental flora.

Now the political tendencies have changed, we have become bioracists and must plant local species in our asphalt cities. Then, let's pull out the Botanical Gardens in Barcelona and let's plant holm oaks, mastic trees and rosemary, and let's ask for another subvention to do it.

Nuria is charming and she will keep on doing her job but she agrees that we have to look for a formula to promote all the plants that we can be introduced in our ornamental flora. We have to support each other and unite our experiences and aims.

José Manuel Sánchez de Lorenzo Cáceres, send us his remarks about this topic, see our forum site:
www.v-ter.com/noticias/forum/jardines_botanicos.htm
 

Hakea laurina in the Botanical Gardens in Barcelona.
December 2004.

 SUSTAINABILITY IN DANGER

Sustainable lawn grass ―also known as macrothermal lawn― yellows in wintertime when temperature drops from -1 to -4ºC.

It needs little or no water, little fertilizer, little mowing and little caring.

What will citizens say if the lawn yellows in January? Will they accept the 'sustainable' label? In the meanwhile, David Bataller Fita has done the Pitch & Putt in Fornells de la Selva (Girona) where only the greens are watered. It is considered to be the most ecological course in Catalonia. Due to the lawn grass varieties used, only 1/20 of its surface ―equivalent to a football pitch― needs to be watered.

It has Festuca rubra on the raffs, Cynodon dactylon on the training course, Bermuda Princess on the fairways and Agrostis A-4 on the greens.

I could not spend my holidays in Guinea, I waited two months for the visa and it never arrived. Relationships between Spain and Guinea are in a terrible moment.

Traveling to North East Cuba was my last-minute choice. It was my second trip to Cuba and I suppose the last one to the revolutionary Cuba.
 

The Miami boys will rush in when Fidel dies. And I do not think that this last-minute opening to Europe stops their Western-like entry.

When my 12-years-old son Pol played Gameboy with Raúl, the driver's son, Raúl could not believe what his eyes saw, but when they both played chess, my son lost the game in a matter of minutes.

All children are nicely dressed, clean, healthy and polite; this is the new generation of Cubans from Cuba. It is not the same in the Dominican Republic, Haiti or Jamaica, even when they can choose their president as if democracy was an example of well-doing. Obiang received 96% of votes.

Opening, progress!! Towards what?

Is Puerto Rico the good example???

Cuba, December 2004