Kim Stoddart shares more of her tried and tested, time and money saving gems
So often gardeners feel guilt about their gardens, feel they aren’t doing enough, growing enough, everything just isn’t quite … enough. I’m not just talking beginner-level gardeners here either. On courses I run, highly experienced, long-standing gardeners often feel the same, and really isn’t it time we were all a little kinder to ourselves, and our precious outside spaces in the process?
The good news is there are lots of ways to reduce our workloads without impacting negatively on growing efforts, and in fact we can often build a greater all-weather resilience as a result. This may sound a little too good to be true but through more than a decade of experimenting with just this, I’m here to tell you the rewards are sweet.
Just remember it’s always important to garden in a way that works for you and to make it your own. I don’t have a lot of time to actually garden, so when I do, I want it to be productive yet relaxing and nurturing, and to have fun playing with my plot. This means I have pushed the boundaries of how wild you can get away with growing crops to the limit at times, with the most amazing results. This doesn’t mean I don’t like to be more hands-on sometimes with primping and polishing, I really do, I’m just here to show you there are fantastic fruitful freedoms to be found in the most surprising places if we allow more space for the natural world to shine on through.
Grow plants on for longer
So often there’s still a one in, one out, one in… approach to vegetable gardening. Plants being pulled as they are harvested, or have finished producing, with the pressure of near constant seed sowing and planting out to fill gaps.
Yet often plants have more to give if we allow them the opportunity to grow on.
Here are just a few examples:
Broad beans
One of my favourite beans of all, these plants can in fact be cut back after they have finished producing (almost to the ground) and in healthy soil and the right conditions they can merrily provide a second, smaller but no less fantastic flush of pods. Runner beans can also live on at the end of the season and be overwintered (if removed or covered to protect from the cold).
Potatoes
There is a sheer joy to the harvesting of lovely home-grown tubers. Digging for treasure no lesswhat a treat! Yet when pulling spuds, I’m sure you’ve all experienced this, t
