Editorial

Jo McCarroll calls for gardeners to rally round to help save our G&Ts.

Gardening may always begins with a G but for me it often ends with a G too. Now before you question my literacy I understand that gardening always ends with a G if you are speaking literally – as in, in terms of the letter. But I am talking spiritually – as in, in terms of the spirit. There is little nicer than ending a day of gardening with a glass of G to which T, ice and a slice of lemon have been added.

We have a fascinating story in this issue on junipers, the plant family including Juniperus communis which produces the berries that give gin its distinctive flavour and aroma. In fact, gin actually got its name from the Dutch word for juniper, which is genever.

The juniper berries used to make gin in New Zealand, and in fact almost everywhere else in the world, are now mainly picked off wild trees in Macedonia and Albania. But wild juniper plants in some places overseas are in an extremely precarious position. Some Juniperus populations – already under pressure due to fragmented populations, difficulties regenerating and animal predation – are now at risk of being wiped out by the fungal disease, Phytophthora austrocedri, which causes foliage to die back and eventually the plant to die.

So great is the concern felt by gin-lovers, I mean plant-lovers, for juniper’s future that Juniperus was the first plant genus fully collected and stored in the millennium seed bank by the UK national tree seed project, a horticultural initiative by the Royal Botanic Gardens in Kew to collect seed from all the UK’s native woody plants.

But fear not my thirsty green-fingered friends! New Zealand is poised – as always – to save the day. Scientists at Massey, in collaboration with two local gin producers, Juno Gin in Taranaki and Reefton Distilling Co in the West Coast, have launched an ambitious citizen science project, The Great New Zealand Juniper Hunt. The aim is for gardeners and gin-lovers to keep an eye out for Juniperus communis growing in gardens or parks (or in the wild since the seed is widely dispersed by birds) and, if they find any, post the location and photos on inaturalist.org/ projects/the-great-new-zealand-juniper-hunt.

“By mid 2019 we hope to know where berry-laden junipers are located across New Zealand, and to conduct genetic analysis on selected samples and volatiles analysis of the berries before the end of the year,” says Massey’s Talon Sneddon who is managing the hunt.

Eventually cuttings will be taken from trees determined to be genetically diverse, with the aim of ensuring a viable and disease resistant population in New Zealand which could be commercially cultivated – and hopefully save gin for all humanity.

Want to do your bit? Well, rather unhelpfully Juniperus communis can be extremely varied in its size and shape, but there are some clues worth looking out for. You are looking for a conifer with needle-like leaves with sharp tips up to 25mm long. The needles will point up and out rather than down the stem, and are green with a white band down the centre. The all-important berries are 5-6mm wide and blue-black when ripe. Robyn Abernethy from Dunedin Botanic Garden says if you are unsure if a conifer is a juniper, stick your hand into it. Junipers are prickly on the inside.

NZ Gardener is throwing its considerable authority behind this endeavour. So let the spirit move you, my friends, and begin. So there will be gin. Because there is no gardening without G. And that is both literally – and more importantly, spiritually – true.