Speaker 1: Hello, and welcome to Gardening with Ben. You'll go to
a podcast for all things green and growing. I'm Ben,
your allotment guide and here to help you cultivate your
garden and your passion for plants. Whether you're a seasoned
gardener or just starting out, this podcast is for you.
Each episode will dig into tips, tricks, and techniques to
make your garden and allotment thrive from planting, sewing, and growing.
We will share all the tips and i'd advice. We
will also have regular episodes talking about what we have
been up to on the a lotment. So sit back,
grab a brew and enjoy today's episode. Hey everyone, and
welcome back to Gardening with Ben. Well it's Thursday morning.
And well, if you're listening straight away it's Thursday morning,
that it is. But if you're listening later, obviously it's
maybe not be Thursday, but it is Thursday. And yeah,
we're getting ever closer to that weekend and I can't wait.
I'm starting to write my list, starting to think about
what I'm going to be doing down on the allotment.
I'm planning my weekend out down there. And one of
I said, I talked about my daily reel of the
day what I usually post and yesterdays what went up
last night? Wow, that is a good one. And the
question on the reel is do you share your homegrown
produce with your friends and family? Now, certain stuff, yeah,
I'll share that endlessly, like man lettuce, my rubarb, my apples,
everything apart from strawberries and sweet coon, I won't share
them with anyone, even if it's my mum, even if
it's my sister. I won't share my strawberries and sweet
corn with anyone because they are my two favorite things
that I've grown the allotment, and you can never grow
enough sweet corn and you can never grow enough strawberries.
Like I said, I've got two hundred plants on my allotment,
so I get plenty of strawberries, but I don't share
them because they're absolutely delicious. And the thing is, like
strawberries and sweet corn, once you've grown them, they've gone.
If you get my like you'll eat them pretty much
straight away and get them all eaten. But yeah, there's
certain stuff like you will share loads of it with
family and friends, and sometimes they'll have enough of it
they'll get fig I hope you don't fetch me any
more corse yets, because you can certainly have too many
corsets and people get fed up with them after a while.
But certain stuff I will keep for myself. I don't
share some of it out obviously, because it is quite
expensive in shops and supermarkets, certain stuff. So I'm pretty
much one for keeping it for myself and enjoying it
because I've put all the hard work into doing it,
and yeah, why not enjoy the rewards from the allotment?
So what are we going to be talking about in
today's podcast? What's today's podcast theme of the day? So
today's podcast theme is why should we start an allotment?
Why should we start growing our own produce? Yes, we've
not talked about this, actually, this is one topic we've
not actually talked about. We've talked about like who I
am and why I got started and everything, but why
should we start growing our own produce? And yeah, when
you go to the supermarket, you'll find certain stuff pretty
cheap to buy, like your tomatoes. You'll get a load
of tomatoes for a pound or something like that. But yeah,
loads of stuff are pretty cheap. Certain stuff fair enough,
they're not cheap like blackberries, your rhubarb, your corjets, your marrows,
your pumpkins. There's certain stuff out there that are quite expensive,
and more and more stuff is getting more and more expensive,
especially like the fruit and vegetables. They're getting quite expensive
to purchase down, So why should we start growing an allotment?
Like I got my allotment, and the first things that
I planted on my allotment was my roubarb plants, which
I've got sixteen crowns in of rhubarb. I've got my
plum tree. I've got my apple tree, which is a
cooking apple tree, and I've got some eating apple trees.
And yeah, those were the first things that I put in,
and my raspberries as well, and they pay for my
allotment in themselves, because cooking apples are so expensive to buy,
and like I said, rhubarb is so expensive to buy,
Like you'll go to the supermarket and it they'll be
like three sticks for two pounds. You think rule Bob's
one of the easiest things to grow out a lot
of them, but yeah, it's so expensive to buy. So
the reasons why you should start an allotment or grow
in your own in your garden. I believe is that, yes,
it can be more expensive in some cases. Some cases
can be more expensive, but some cases it can be
hell of a lot cheaper. Like for a packet of
lettice seeds, it will cost you like fifty pence and
you'll get a thousand seeds in there, most of them
literally all of them will germinate. Lettuce seeds are easy
to germinate and they take no trouble in growing whatsoever.
So you can have so many lettuce from just fifty
pence and it won't hardly cost you a penny. Maybe
it'll cost you a bit for the compost and for
the water. Depends how much you pay for your water
and stuff like that, but certain stuff it's worth it.
Like my allotment for a year costs me one hundred
pounds a year. My allotment costs and that includes water
as well, So if it didn't include water, it'd probably
be about sixty pound. But council allotments are a bit
more money than private allotments. But but yeah, we've got
we pay about one hundred pounds of it. And like
I said, out of them plants, what I grow, my roubile,
my cooking apples, my plums, my raspberries. I make my
money back on my allotment. I don't sell them. We're
not allowed to sell produce on the allotment. That is
one of the rules. You're not allowed to make profit
from selling stuff on the allotment. So I don't sell
anything personally. But to have bought that through from the supermarket, wow,
it had cost me absolutely loads. And with the amount
of blackberries I've been having off and my raspberries I
get so much it pays for it over and over again.
So it does work out a lot cheaper in certain
aspects certain stuff, and obviously some other stuff might not
be as cheap, Like if a crop fails and it
doesn't do very well, you've wasted a lot of money.
And yeah, I grow my potatoes in boxes, which uses
a lot of compost, and the compost is a lot
of money to purchase, and that'll probably be cheaper to
buy potatoes from the shop than is to grow them
in boxes. But the taste freshure, the organic, you know
what you've put into that to grow it. You know
all the chemicals that have gone in which have been nothing.
Probably like me, I don't put no chemicals in my
growing and yeah, they taste absolutely delicious, so much better.
And obviously growing your own producers, well you are outside
in the fresh air. Like if I lived in a
house and I've got my own garden or greenhouse, I'd
be in there every night just potting up and growing
stuff like that. But unfortunately I've got a lotment. I
live in a flat, so I've not got a green
house or a garden. But I'd love to be in
my garden all night, just like pottering around and potting
stuff up and taking cuttings and growing stuff and experimenting
and streaming all the time while I'm in my garden,
But unfortunately I can't do that. But there's so much
benefit out of going in the garden and being in
the fresh air. And I've talked about it in like
my mental health podcasts that there it is proven that
when you putting your hands in the soil and you're
reaching in and the there's something in it what gives
you endorphins to make you feel better and more happy
in being out in the garden. And obviously there's no
sounds around. All you're hearing is the birds, the planes,
maybe a bit of traffic or something like that. But
where my allotment is is absolutely peaceful and there's no
traffic around. It's absolutely fantastic, and the only noises around
are the birds, and it's just so nice to switch
off and be at peace, nothing to disturb you. If
you want to turn your mobile phone off while you're
there or put on do not disturb or silence, and
you've got nothing around you and you've got no worries,
nobody disturbing you. You're just there enjoying doing what you
want yourself. So there is so much benefit into growing
your own produce, and if you aren't growing your own produce,
I do recommend it. Like people say, oh, I've not
got much of a garden, I can't grow much in
my garden because it's not very big. Or I only
live in a flat with a little balcony. I can't
grow anything on my balcony. Yes you can. There's so
many opportunities out there if you've got a small garden
or if you've got a balcony to grow stuff on
your balcony. There's so many different methods of growing produce
and getting the best of it. The only person who
says they can't grow anything in their flat is made
because I've not got a balcony. But yeah, there's so
much benefit to growing and starting an allotment, or starting
a kitchen garden or starting your no dig bed. But
if you're thinking about doing it, give it a go.
I'm always around to share tips and advice and ask
questions too, So if you've got any questions, feel free
to drop me a question on Instagram. And I've started
putting my links to my other social media in the
description now, so if you're not following me on any
of the other social media's, please do give me a follow.
And I post different stuff on different platforms, like I've
sharing daily questions on YouTube. I'm sharing blogs on YouTube
and on Facebook. But yeah, I'm sharing so much at
the moment, and the content just keeps on coming out
at the moment. I'm just pushing it and pushing it
and push it. One day I will be famous. One
day you'll see me on Gardeners World. One can only hope.
But that is the reason why we should start in
a lotment. The mental health, the taste of the produce,
being out in the fresh air, switching off and enjoying
being at peace, and obviously the fresh produce and the
delicious taste of it was you have harvested it. So
if you've enjoyed this podcast, everyone, please do give it
a like. Please do leave a comment below and let
me know as well. Send me a message and let
me know if you share your produce with anybody, or
you like me, you save all your strawberries and your
sweet cord, or do you have a favorite one that
you say what you don't share with anyone? Let me know.
So until next time, everyone, remember keep smiling, keep shining,
and keep guardening with everyone. Thank you for joining me
on this episode of Gardening with Ben. I hope you
have found some useful tips and integration for your own
gardening and a lotment journey. If you have enjoyed today's episode,
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remember keep smiling, keep shining, and keep gardening with them.