The Depression Hobby Gardening Has a Renaissance

Dig for Victory is in the air again, only it’s an economic war that Britons are now fighting. The news that growbag sales have increased fivefold this spring compared with last year is a good sign.

The pleasures of burying one’s hands in the soil are no longer the preserve of horny-handed men with sheds, or fragrant ladies proffering trugs and scones, but cut across class and demographic boundaries. Everyone is at it, even if it’s only windowboxes, balconies, or a cluster of growbags outside a front door in a block of council flats. Heavens, gardening is now even becoming fashionable among late twenty- and thirty-somethings in cities, with waiting lists for allotments within striking distance of fashionable areas.

In my own case, my wife and I – who are not thirtysomethings any more, alas – discussed the merits of an allotment, but opted to create a ”home allotment”. It was the potential journey to and from an allotment that put us off, not least because of the car use. So we turned over the little-used lawn in the small garden behind our terrace house in north London and laid simple brick paths around and through it. It’s not exactly The Good Life, but it’s possible for us to get home at eight or nine o’clock at night and do a spot of gardening for half an hour if we fancy it. Perfect.

We grow all kinds of salad leaves, beans, carrots and other veg, with varying degrees of success, it has to be said, while I have just managed to miss the seasonal deadline (again!) for putting in fruit bushes all around the edge of our new plot. It is rather impressive to discover that specialist fruit nurseries will not even consider taking money for bushes when buyers ask after the deadline. At least the world of fruit-growing has not gone financially haywire.

In fact, everything in the garden this year seems to be, as they say, lovely, with recent rain a promising prelude to a floriferous summer, and the best bluebell season in living memory underway. Meanwhile, Chelsea Flower Show is almost upon us, with ticket sales as strong as ever (despite a reduction in main show gardens from 21 to 13 this year), and the Royal Botanic Gardens at Kew is busy celebrating its 250th anniversary.

Growing your own dovetails with a new eagerness among consumers to buy British. Indeed, food is one area where that much derided attribute, patriotism, appears to be respectable again: by buying British we are not only helping the national economy, but also helping the environment by reducing food miles: just 10 per cent of fruit consumed in Britain is grown here.

The demand for good-quality British produce at a reasonable price contrasts with what is being offered by the fruit and veg industry. Even that most British of apples, the classic Cox, is being displaced by the Gala, the bigger, shinier interloper from New Zealand.

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May 9, 2009