Less work, more edible results

Kim Stoddart shares more of her tried and tested, time and money-saving gems

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So often gardeners feel guilty 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 our growing efforts, and we can often build greater all-weather resilience in the process. This may sound a little too good to be true, but through more than a decade of experimenting with this, I can tell you the rewards are sweet.

It's always important to garden in a way that works for you, 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 that at times I have pushed the boundaries of how wild you can be with growing crops, with the most amazing results. It isn't that 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 fantastically fruitful freedoms to be found in the most surprising places if we allow more space for the natural world to shine through.

GROW PLANTS FOR LONGER