GROWING

The taste of freshly grown produce is only one of the reasons we grow our own food.  We are definitely not Tom and Barbara Good.  We buy food that we don’t grow but where we can, we support British farmers and growers and fairly traded goods.  Growing, for us, is also a way of life, a pleasure - although don’t remind me of that when it’s summer and we are weeding for hours! – an interest and a way of ensuring that some of what we eat is grown sustainably.

We grow from seed but we also ‘buy in’ garlic cloves, onion sets and some plants that need a longer growing time than our northern climate can allow, such as aubergines. We grow and harvest twelve months of the year.  Winter is, of necessity, a quiet time of harvest but nonetheless, we harvest salads, oriental veg, brassicas, leeks, Jerusalem artichokes and herbs.  We also use our potatoes, onions, shallots and garlic from store and have fruit and processed veg in the freezer.  Home grown raspberries in January are a special treat and a reminder of why we grow.

For those who are contemplating starting an allotment for the first time, we’d say, “Yes! Do it.” We’d also say, “start small.”

Here are somethings we wish we’d known when we started gardening in this northern climate: 

  • Allocate plenty of time in Spring and Summer for growing, sowing, harvesting and weeding;

  • Don’t be too ambitious.  Start with a few crops you know you’ll eat.  Easy crops are: lettuce, salads, potatoes, onions, garlic, raspberries, to name a few staples that we stick in the ground and, apart from weeding and watering when necessary, let them get on with it.

  • Don’t spend too much money on things you can make and think carefully about tools.  Buy the best you can, British if possible and ask friends and family to chip in and buy you a few good tools that will last. Avoid plastic and if you use it, as in some cases, it can be the only solution, or one that suits your purpose, re-use and re-use.  Try, as far as possible to opt for recyclable materials.

  • Read. Read. Read.  There are loads of great gardening books, website and blogs available for free.  Make a list of those books you’d like to keep by your side and ask for them as presents. That will make the authors happy, too!  Other than that, the internet is a great resource and public libraries are an underused resource when it comes to gardening books.  Those big, hardback glossy ones are lovely companions for the slower, colder months and most libraries have inter-library loan facilities, where you can order from other libraries.  Charity shops can be great for sourcing all sorts of gardening books.  I’ll be featuring some good websites and blogs in my own blog, so keep looking.  I’ll also be reviewing books, both new and classic, so watch the reviews page here.

  • Plan, plan, plan.  Was it Eisenhower who is supposed to have said, “Planning is essential but plans are useless”?  I agree but planning gives you an idea of what needs to be done even if hoeing the onions must be set aside because caterpillars are crawling on the cabbages.  Don’t forget to download my growing calendar here.

  • Have fun and enjoy it.  Stop now and again and relish being in the outdoors.  My favourite time outside is late winter and early spring.  Goodness, it can be cold but I soon warm up and the magical sight of the geese flying overhead at dusk, sounding to each other and flying in formation like the Red Arrows thrills me every time and every season.  I was once revelling in a light fall of snow as I did some tidying in the garden when Mr Hearth called from a window, “It really is time to come in.”  To which I replied, “I’m practising for when I join the Mounties” which was a childhood ambition, alas, too late to be fulfilled but, in a snow shower, I can pretend.

  • Find a like-minded soul with whom to share gardening ideas and discussion.  You can also share seeds and plants if you don’t belong to a seed group or similar. It can feel a bit lonely, sometimes, particularly when you’ve had a few problems.

  • Never, ever call problems ‘failures’.  When plants don’t grow, don’t fruit, or the bugs destroy a crop, or the weeds get you down, these are opportunities to learn, to assess and to become a better gardener. At the moment, I’d say our veg garden is a tip.  We’ve had a busy autumn with lots of house guests and stuff hasn’t been done but it’s not a ‘failure’, just something that needs sorting out, something we need to think about during busy times.