The Beginning of a Food Growing Revolution

As those of you who follow me on Twitter or on Facebook will know, growing food is my absolute passion. Its something I do because its just a part of who I am and one of the things I am lucky to not only do myself, but also teach other people to do, hopefully infecting them with the same excitement it has for me.

The Incredible Edible movement has always been of fascination to me, mainly due to the fact that it not only aims for the areas that link into its ethos to grow within the public sphere but also because it brings different communities together to work on projects and so makes new communities. Often growing anything in the urban landscape is beyond the realms of possibility for many, let alone the idea of growing food, and yet places such as the amazing Todmorden in West Yorkshire have made it possible to do just that, whilst creating communities of people whilst they are gardening.

So when I tweeted last week asking why there was no Incredible Edible Bristol and would anyone be interested I wasnt that surprised to hear people saying they were definitely interested. Bristol is a city of food growing people. Many of them are allotment gardeners but equally there are a myriad of food growing projects that rely on communities to support them and help them with their growing. However, often these are hidden way and not that well publicised and so unless youre looking for a project to work with you may not realise they are there. The city farms all have amazing growing projects and there are several great community allotments and orchards. Incredible Edible Bristol wants to bring the wonderous nature of these projects together to bring food growing to the streets and to the people. We aim to be completely inclusive, to create links between the growing groups, to grow food in and on any spare land we can find both in the city centre and in every area of the city and to give people a learning expereince so that they can go away having learned how to put the idea of growing into practice for themselves.

The scary facts are that Britain is never more than 3 days away from a food crisis and that, mixed with the facts that there are people relying on food banks up and down the country and that often people dont know how to deal with fresh produce and so are slightly put off by it, are terrifying. We rely on a chain of delivery that could fall apart easily as was seen when the fuel tanker drivers went on strike only a few years ago. By creating this project people can take back the responsibility of food production, stop being reliant on the huge supermarkets who are far more interested in their profits than they are in the state of the nations health and know how and where the food on their tables was produced.

So people of Bristol, "if you eat, youre in"

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BritishFlowers

For a long time now I have been a huge advocate of the British Flower grower and in particular of the new phase of growers, who are absolutely passionate about what they do, as they should be. Buy a bouquet or have your wedding flowers done by these growers and you can be guaranteed that they will be seasonal, have been grown without pesticide use and usually to organic standards, that they will have been cut and conditioned beautifully and that they last for at least a week in a vase.

So imagine, to my horror, seeing a tweet that said that Interflora had collaborated with the RHS to make, what they are marketing as The Ultimate Love Bouquet using flowers with different symbolic meanings of love. However,to me having Agapanthus in the same bouquet as Hyacinths puts two fingers up at seasonality and whilst I want to believe their tweet that 60% of the flowers in the bouquet are sourced in the UK, I assume by that they mean bought at markets in the UK but not British grown. Perhaps the Ivy is UK grown and a few of the tulips but my overall feeling is that most of those flowers have been flown in from Africa and South America, where they are grown on vast farms that rely on pesticides to keep the plants in tip top health and use water for irrigation that is needed much more by local people.

So, and heres to the power of Twitter, Interflora asked for my number and their Commercial Director, Helen Quinn rang me. Knowing how Interflora work, (they are all franchises and the individual florist is responsible for buying their own stock), I asked how they felt they could be certain that any of the flowers were UK grown, to be met with the reply that after speaking to a couple of their florists today they had found that up to 5 out of the 10 stems were UK grown but this could not be guaranteed as they are countrywide and obviously there is no way that all the florists could be contacted. So at the most, the ivy, tulips, hyacinths, myrtle and chysanthemums (although I question the chrysanths and I am not alone in that) may be in some part UK grown. However, in the conversations they had with The RHS where the plants were grown was never discussed, it was all about the symbolic use of the flowers. And I just want to reiterate that Interflora cannot guarantee any of the bouquet will be British grown.

At this point I want to say fair play to Interflora for their transparency. But in the mean time  I also want to ask what the foremost horticultural charity, The RHS, is doing to promote the growers in this country and sadly it appears they are doing very little if anything at all. They were included in all the tweets today and there was not one single reply, so at best theyre hiding in embarrassment and at worst? The RHS do stirling work in its gardens and with initiatives such as Britain in Bloom and their growing in schools projects but the British horticultural industry, of which our flower grower are an integral part, needs them to be behind it and this seems to show, not for the first time, that they are not.

There will, of course, be some people doubting that there are enough flowers being grown in the UK at this time of year to create beautiful Valentine bouquets, but to them I say, have faith and look around you. There are beautifully scented flowers around right now as well as amazing bulbs such as narcissi and hyacinths coming from Cornwall and the Channel Islands. I for one would rather have 10 stems of stunningly scented Sarcococca than roses with no scent that have been flown half way across the world, quite literally.

So heres my thoughts. Dont not buy flowers, but be aware of the fact that there is an industry in this country that grows and prepares and sells and does floristry with, stunning British grown flowers all year round. As a nation weve become used to picking up flowers in the supermarket for tiny prices but be aware of the environmental impact those flowers are having and think twice. Surely flowers are a luxury, not to be taken forgranted and so rather than picking up a bunch unthinkingly, ask where they are from and if the shop has a British equivalent, and if not ask why not. All British flowers in the supermarkets are labelled as such and your florist really ought to be able to tell you the provenance of their flowers, and if they cant, speak up and ask them to find out. Tell your friends and neighbours about the British flower industry and ask them to support it too. Explain to your partner why you are asking for British grown flowers, and be proud to support an industry that is thriving and exciting.

And for all you non-believers, here are a selection of flowers from Common Farm Flowers in Somerset, an artisan florist business that both grows beautiful flowers and prepares them to send out across the country every day. All these flowers are seasonal and available now.

And finally, thank you from all the flower growers, large and small, for taking the time to read this and if you fancy joining in the chat there is a #britishflowers hour every monday from 8-9 on Twitter and all the growers are online and have Facebook pages that you can follow all year around.

There is an adendum to this now.
I spoke to the RHS earlier this afternoon and they have apologised, mainly because when the bouquet was first tweeted their press stuff wasnt ready and thay had hoped to offer the Interflora bouqet alongside the Tregothnan one, with the whole thing being a bit tongue in cheek. They are aware that this has gone awry for them and I think are mortified that the British flower industry and all our small growers have felt so maligned by them. I am going to do some work with them to try to improve relations between growers and the RHS so watch this space for more details.

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The influence of a certain Mr Lloyd

There appears to be a lot of writing about Great Dixter and Christopher Lloyds influence on the gardens of today going on at the moment and its hardly surprising! The Garden Museum had an excellent exhibition about him and his life last year alongside Dixteresque planting in their borders, which I was lucky enough to help plant with their intern ,Matt Collins, last summer. There have been several books released about the man and his life recently and no one has readily stepped into his influential shoes. So just for a moment I would like to add my own reminiscence.

Eight years ago I lost my Mum, who up until then had been my gardening guru as she could, annoyingly, grow anything, anywhere. In the months after she died I felt the need to visit certain places and gardens that I knew she had loved and been influenced by, and needless to say, Great Dixter was one of those places. So there I was, on a very quiet, grey and cloudy Wednesday afternoon, feeling very bad and sitting on a seat in Dixters garden in a morbid world of my own. Someone sat down next to me, said "Good afternoon" and enquired as to why the sad face, and before I knew it I had poured out the lot...and it was a lot, before I looked up to see Christopher Lloyd sitting next to me, listening intently. I apologised profusely for my rambling and he asked if visiting had made anything any better. My reply was not really but that the garden was stunning and that in time I thought it would. We spoke about mothers for a while and he made his excuses and ambled away, dachaunds following after saying how important it was to follow true loves and influences in life.

I now realise it was at that point that I decided to leave my reasonably successful career in catering and find my way in horticulture so I guess you could say that The Physic Garden, in my mind, is an amalgam of mine and Mums love of plants and gardens, mixed with Kristis enthusiasm and a kick up the backside into action by the great Christo himself.

So, how can it fail....its just not an option!! Today we have sown more chillies, potted on Salvia patens and next weekend there will be Phlomis, Chinese Lanterns and more Chillies to pot on and the propagator to fill with more seeds. Its all starting to happen and is so exciting I can hardly even explain.

So, whatever other folks thoughts on Christopher Lloyd, I can only thank hi for pulling me out of grief and making me use it as a starting point to a better and more fulfilled life. Now all I need to do is try to work out how nothing ever died in Mums garden.....maybe it just didnt dare!!

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The beginning!

So now I need to begin and with what? Well the aim of this blog is to create a record of the beginning of The Physic Garden project, growing herbs and interesting edibles with the emphasis on producing beautiful plants that can also be useful, in either culinary, medicinal or just cultural ways. So to begin we have sown chilli seeds of several varieties and are about to start sowing some perennial herbs like Echinceas and Salvias And we will see how they go! Already some of the chillis have poked their heads up, but then its the hard time, trying to give them enough moisture without them succumbing to damping off disease and then pricking them out before they get too big to separate but not until they are big enough to handle-oh the pressure!!!
And then what? Well i guess some annual herbs and some interesting edibles like aubergines and gourds and some interesting fruit like wild strawberry and lingonberries maybe. In fact feel free to post any ideas!!
And please everyone, feed those garden birds so they come back in the spring and help with the pesr control!!

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