My First Day

I spent my first day with Garden Organic working on their stand at the Chelsea Flower Show. What a fantastic way to start my year as a Seeds of Change apprentice! It was a fun day chatting to people about Garden Organic’s work and gardening in general. It left me eager to get my hands dirty in the Garden Organic gardens at Ryton the following week.

I’m really excited about the gardens I’m looking after this year. They have a good combination of fruit, vegetables and ornamentals, so I’ll be learning about a broad range of plants and gardening techniques.

In my first week I worked mainly in the soft fruit garden. There are a number of varieties of berries and currants in this garden, so keeping labels up to date for visitors is really important. It’s also an ongoing task trying to keep on top of weeding at this time of year. The next major tasks will be summer pruning, sowing more annual attractants and hopefully picking some great tasting fruit!

The pest and disease control demonstration garden is a lovely space with loads of different vegetables, as well as having ornamental and wildlife areas. Again, up-to-date labelling is important here to explain the different organic techniques being used. I’ve been planting out cucurbits and celery and sowing coriander this month, and I’ll be sowing more seeds soon to ensure there’s a succession of crops.

I’ll be spending more time in the shrub border over the next month, pruning and planting new shrubs and ground cover, and generally familiarising myself with the plants.

I think July is going to be a busy but rewarding month, when harvesting of crops will begin in earnest!