Own Grown Gardening

Right now, the Government is consulting on our vision for England's future land use and how to achieve it. The consultation closes 25 April 2025, so there is still plenty of time remaining to contribute. If you wish to do so, head over to DEFRA's website . It is well worth it. Several questions were seriously on point. So much so, I felt the need to throw my own ideas into the ring. I've included them below. I highly recommend submitting your own thoughts too. Question What are the policies, incentives and other changes that are needed to support decision makers in the agricultural sector to deliver this scale of land use change, while considering the importance of food production? My Response Money is of course the biggest incentive regardless of how depressing it is to say it. If landscape stewardship schemes provide farmers and land owners enough financial incentive to adopt them, they will embrace them whether or not they fundamentally believe in their benefits. If, how...

It is mid-March here in Devon, England, and my two little honeyberry ( Lonicera caerulea ) bushes are just coming into bloom, the perfect time to give them a mention.    They are known for producing some of the earliest fruit of the season. I harvested my first berries from the young bushes last year, just a tiny handful. Judging from the number of flowers both bushes have this year, I'm looking forward to a much bigger bounty. I own two bushes of different varieties. One of them is the variety 'kamtschatica duet' while the other is an unknown variety. They each have distinctively different leaf shapes and growth habits though. Duet has much rounder leaves and slighly sturdier stems.  When buying them, I searched and searched for two different varieties to maximise cross-pollination between the two. Like so many plants, they produce much better harvests when self-pollination is avoided. I should mention, the handful of purple fruit last year were delicious just straight o...