If you have the space available, growing your own fruit and veg can be beneficial for both you and the environment. Tending even the smallest area of earth connects you with nature and improves your wellbeing. While you’re getting your hands dirty, you’re also getting vitamin D through sunlight on your skin, putting fresh air in your lungs and – for many who garden – a little peaceful meditation time and a wonderful sense of achievement. Plus, you’ll enjoy the freshest home-grown veg!
You’ll also be removing some of your dependency on industrial food production. With half of the planet’s land given over to agriculture, food production is responsible for nature loss on a massive scale. To change this, we need a shift to sustainable food production and consumption.
Here are some tips to get you started:
Tip 1. You can make any space work.
You can grow food whether you have lots of space or hardly any at all. Look at your home and grow what suits it best. A window box 10 floors up? Grow tomatoes! Plant salads and herbs in containers inside or out. Tend to spuds in tubs! Or use a sunny wall: tap pins in, secure twine, dig a small border and grow beans upwards. And if you have flower borders, plant veg among the shrubs! Pumpkins can grow under bigger bushes and give you tasty soup in the winter months.
Any patch of your lawn is a veg plot-in-waiting. Make raised beds using the ‘no-dig’ method in Tip 3.
Tip 2. Grow what you actually like to eat.
Make your gardening personal by growing what you like eating and are going to use. If you or your family love carrots, grow them instead of buying them. Do you put garlic in everything? Find out how to grow it yourself. And if your tipple’s mint tea, sow a pot of mint and it’ll grow year-round for you. Growing your own is also a great way to vary your diet and experiment with food. Try growing giant elephant garlic – a much milder taste – or chocolate mint. Like hot sauce? Grow chillies and ferment them, or mooli radish to make kimchi. Or how about growing all the herbs you use in cooking?
Tip 3. No dig.
Growing veg doesn’t have to be back-breaking! Especially if you opt for the no-dig method. Given the name, you won’t be surprised to learn that rather than digging the soil, it involves letting nature – particularly worms – do it for you. Put down a layer of cardboard over your veg bed or the compost in your pots and cover it with more peat-free compost. Time will do the rest. The good news is you don’t have to buy compost, you can make your own by building a little compost heap somewhere for cardboard and vegetable peelings to break down and add to your soil. The benefits of no-dig are that it leaves the soil undisturbed, protecting the microorganisms and natural drainage channels made by worms, and preventing exposure to the air which may affect some beneficial bacteria and fungi. Instead of turning soil over, add more compost!
Tip 4. Start now!
Gardeners are always learning. Every season brings new mysteries, successes, disasters and achievements. There’s lots of information out there to help you, but don’t wait until you’ve read everything on the topic – learn as you go. Which leads us to…
Tip 5. Get a mentor!
A gardening conversation is a good conversation! You can learn a lot from other veg growers – most have tried new methods, failed at some crops and succeeded with others. Follow homesteaders on social media who interest you – these channels are a fantastic source of information. Talk to neighbours or join the community and get an allotment. Most towns rent them cheaply (check your council’s website) and they always have a helpful community with advice and shared facilities. There are also many books, TV programmes (like Gardeners’ World) and even films to look into. A good resource is the Royal Horticultural Society, which has a wealth of tips and information at its disposal.
Grow your own veg this year. Even if you start small, you’ll find it’s a fantastic way to enrich your kitchen, your community and your wellbeing, and to embrace eating in a sustainable way.