This post is not completely on brand, I freely admit. It’s not about growing plants or designing gardens. It’s actually about something that takes place well beyond my garden and, I predict, a long distance from your garden as well. But I felt a need to share and ask your take on the trouble with some car and truck commercials.

This commercial features two Land Rovers racing along (and in) a creek presumably in the British countryside with James Bond, no less, delivering the voice-over sales pitch.

The commercials I have a problem with are those that celebrate the wonders of new, powerful vehicles built to take the driver and passengers just about anywhere in the world–no roads necessary. In fact, these commercials push the idea of getting off the road as soon as possible and just go tear up the countryside. Because you can.

Wherever you want to go

Don’t get me wrong. Off-roading is a huge sport and there are plenty of responsible drivers who have fun spending a weekend exploring their part of the world in a motorized vehicle of some sort without hardly ever having to lay rubber on road. But they’re driving in areas designated for off-roading. In my region, snow mobile trails often become off-roading trails in summer.

This commercial for Dodge Ram touts the truck as “designed for the outer limits [with an] all-terrain capability that’s extra-terrestrial.”

My issue is about car and truck commercials promoting the idea that you should go wherever you want using the wilderness as your playground. Yes, it’s a romantic thought–just take to the open road and then quickly get off it to discover pristine vistas, enjoy remote and incredibly beautiful landscapes and feel the power of your dominion over the land.

The problem as I see it is that these commercials are inspiring people to drive just about anywhere and, in the process, whether consciously or not, doing significant harm to sensitive environments.

Here’s a commercial for Grand Cherokee, featuring a driver exploring the road less taken. Erm, make that the road not taken at all.

The consequences of cars/trucks/ATVs gone wild

If you’ve been following me for awhile, you’ll know I live close to a phenomenal patch of wilderness called the Oliphant fen. This very sensitive area supports an amazing diversity of wildflowers, including native orchids, and wildlife, including species-at-risk such as turtles and some types of snakes.

There are plenty of times throughout the year, however, when the fen has a tendency to look like an old stretch of marshy mud. Somehow, this has attracted some drivers who do high speed donuts in the soft earth.

I wonder if these drivers know that their tire tracks will remain as testament to their irresponsibility for years to come. The fen’s soft ground is very special, made up of a kind of water-logged peat. It acts and feels like a giant sponge. But unlike the sponges you use to clean your home, fens don’t spring back once they’ve been dried. Instead, they retain the shape they’ve been pressed into. So tire tracks–and even foot prints or a dog’s paw prints–remain for a long, long time.

And it’s not just visible tire tracks marring the landscape that are a concern. Wildlife suffers, too. When you go off-roading, you’re entering all kinds of potential nesting sites and places where wildlife forage and sometimes just hang out.

When you’re tearing through wilderness in an SUV, would you see a nest in time to avoid it? Could you turn quickly enough to avoid a collision with a bird or a snake?

I don’t want to get all tree-huggy on you. I’m just fed up with a culture (I’m talking North American, here) where so often the world outside your own property is promoted as fair game to do whatever you want without thought for the impact your actions may have on the environment. Car commercials in particular have struck me as being a huge promoter of this attitude. In fact, I find these commercials glorify this attitude.

I named this blog Ministry Of The Fence because I was inspired by the idea that fences are terrific for defining spaces but they’re also a reminder that there’s a big, wide world out there beyond our garden’s fence and each person’s garden is a part of our shared world. The choices we make as gardeners can affect what happens to the world around us, from the health of an insect population to the flow of a breeze to erosion, regardless of our garden’s size. So I guess I’m making the suggestion that we, as gardeners, can make an impact on how people think about the world around us as well.

How do we do this? Writing letters to Ford and Dodge and Land Rover might do something but I’m not sure it would be hugely effective. Honestly, I believe the best thing we can do is to teach our children well (with a nod to Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young). How wonderful would it be if all of our children and grandchildren saw their own private gardens as well as the beautiful wild spaces that belong to all of us as one big, interconnected web of life that needs to be appreciated and protected.

I’m very interested to know your thoughts on this. Do commercials showing cars barreling across a wild landscape get you irate, too? And thanks for hearing me out.

FYI: Roadtrippers magazine has a good article entitled “How to be a responsible overland or off-roader, according to the experts” which covers the challenges and rewards of “treading lightly” with your vehicle.