For a long time, Cape Town’s Kirstenbosch National Botanical Garden has been accessible only to a lucky few. But what about the not-so-lucky many who have never had a chance to experience the educational benefits and beauty of these gardens? The National Botanical Institute decided it was time to ensure that more people were exposed to the garden’s aesthetic and educational benefits – giving rise to the Kirstenbosch Outreach Greening project.
Three needs were identified by the outreach project: improved access to Kirstenbosch; teaching horticultural skills and increasing environmental awareness; and opening the way for community-based conservation of natural vegetation on the Cape Flats, currently undergoing the difficult process of social transformation.
To address the first need, the Kirstenbosch bus was introduced. It provides free or subsidised transport to the garden for school pupils and seniors from township areas. The second need is being addressed by encouraging and helping schools to make their own gardens in their school grounds.
Thirdly, where better to start conserving natural vegetation than to target an area in which a rare plant grows? Between the crowded townships of eastern metropolitan Cape Town there are a few remnants of natural vegetation that have more or less survived the onslaught of urbanisation. One of these is the 3,7ha Isoetes Vlei Reserve, a patch of wetland that is home to some of the last remaining individuals of a small aquatic plant called Isoetes capensis.
This plant is related to the ferns and has very ancient origins – its ancestors once shared the landscape with dinosaurs. In the mid-1950s Edith Stephens, a conservation-minded botanist at the University of Cape Town, bought this piece of land and donated it to Kirstenbosch for safekeeping of Isoetes and some of the other Cape Flats floral treasures that occur there.
Local government has consolidated approximately 40ha of surrounding land – a triangle bordered by Lansdowne Road, Vanguard Drive and Duinefontein Road, much of it with high conservation value. The Table Mountain Fund of WWF-SA, the conservation organisation, provided funding to initiate a project that could draw together all of the stakeholders who might have an interest in this land, and the Edith Stephens Wetland Park became a reality.
Since the initiation of that process last year, more roleplayers have been drawn into the Isoetes Vlei Reserve project, most significantly the renowned Working for Water Programme of the Department of Water Affairs and Forestry, and the Wetland Restoration Programme of the Department of Environmental Affairs and Tourism.
Under the passionate supervision of the on-site project leader, Mzwandile Leon Peter, the land is now being cleared of alien invasive vegetation and rubble, and a set of buildings is being restored for use as a community resource centre.
“Increasingly we realise that it is impossible to manage natural systems without taking people into account,” says George Davis, project development head at the National Botanical Institute. “Through the Edith Stephens Wetland Park, the best approaches to environmental management can be explored, while at the same time a valuable community resource can be developed for environmental education, community recreation, as well as for the conservation of several rare and endangered plant species.
“Our aim is to build on the good work that has been done by the Rondevlei Nature Reserve downstream on the Lotus River, and to extend the concept of community-based conservation throughout the Cape Flats.”
On a social level, it is hoped that this “park in the middle” will serve to bring the people of the surrounding areas – Philippi, Hanover Park, Gugulethu, Manenberg and Nyanga – together. Interest has been shown by, among others, the Manenberg People’s Centre, the Hanover Park Reconstruction and Development Programme Forum, the Gugulethu Youth Group and several schools.
Says Geralda Wildschut of Selfhelp Manenberg: “The park is a great opportunity for the community of Manenberg and other communities involved to work together — to learn, own and be part of a nature conservation project, which will offer training, teaching and leisure opportunities.”
In the middle of residential chaos, this wetland reserve will bring nature and people together, so that they may benefit from each other.