Abstract
Home gardens represent critical spaces in the configuration of socio-ecological landscapes and an increasing number of local and regional governments have begun including them within their resilience strategies, local biodiversity action plans, and food or health agendas. This paper contributes to the limited literature on contemporary home gardening in the Global North with a pilot study of Czech home gardens.
This study aims to: (i) reveal what is the current role of the home garden and how the gardeners themselves perceive the care of their gardens; (ii) asses what is the potential of "scaling up" home gardens to address problems on a larger scale and how the gardeners understand the potential of their contribution to urban environment. This pilot study uses data collected during a questionnaire survey of 464 home gardens in different settlement types in Czechia.
The results show that home gardens may provide important amenities for individual gardeners and their families, while at the same time contributing to both intended and unintended environmental consequences at the level of whole neighbourhoods or green space in general. The scaling up of home gardens in making cities more sustainable is possible and desirable, but a strategy for communication must involve both the top-down and bottom- up approaches and tools sensitive to a variety of diverse populations who tend home gardens.