Preserving historic gardens in the climate crisis Herculean task

The conclusions include looking at the entire spectrum of the soil-water-plant complex and readjusting park maintenance management. In the past, too much had been outsourced "and now has to be reintegrated into the preservation processes, sometimes laboriously and at great expense", said Panning. This applies, for example, to the storage capacity and fertility of the soil, the retention of surface water in the grounds, the construction of cisterns or the cultivation of hardy trees and shrubs in in-house nurseries.

Historic gardens have been dealing with the problem of climate change for over 20 years. In the past, gardeners were able to "optimize the consequences with all kinds of tricks", said Schreiber. "This deceptive balance was completely overturned in the catastrophic drought years of 2018 to 2020." The water supply to the old trees collapsed, the number of trees felled increased tenfold and irreversible losses due to new damaging factors increased "alarmingly", according to the report. In view of this, preserving the masterpieces of garden art authentically is "a Herculean task".

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