The Vegetable and Herb Expert - Dr D G Hessayon

When I grew up, we had Percy Thrower in black and white on the TV, the gardeners’ answer to Barry Bucknell’s DIY. We also had those ‘expert’ gardening bibles from Dr David Hessayon whose somewhat simple but straightforward books sold over 51 million copies and are as relevant today as they were some 50 years ago. Their popularity was such that the sales nearly equated to one for every household in the UK.

Then came the new gardeners to grace our lives; Geoff Hamilton, Alan Tichmarch, Anne Swithinbank, Pippa Greenwood, Charlie Dimmock, Bob Flowerfew, Joe Swift and many more. We now have the superstar and everyone’s favourite, Monty Don. These have all graced our TV, presented on radio and written books, for magazines and many column inches in those weekend newspapers.

We appear to have an insatiable appetite for all things gardening. One day Monty shows us an old trick on how to pot on plants without disturbing their roots and next its all over the internet with everyone with a smartphone posting it as the best tip of the day. One recommendation on TV and like some famous cook shows impact on supermarkets, the garden centres are stripped of the recommended plant.

At our allotment site we have a significant number of magazines which have been kindly donated by members and which provide a source of reference to be shared by all. I wanted to spend some lockdown time looking through these, so I arrived home with some 40 gardening magazines from our library covered May, June and some of July and roughly the years 2014 to 2018. The magazines were Gardeners’ World, Grow Your Own, Kitchen Garden and Gardening News.

Some of the magazines were weeklies, others monthly and all included vegetables and allotment subjects and all featured household gardening names and personalities. Today there are some dozen or so gardening magazines published in the UK and vying for all our attention.

I wet my lips and could not wait to learn everything that one needs to know about growing in this important part of the season and to gain some great tips on how to improve my harvest.

There was so much to digest I found myself overwhelmed with advice on how to, when to, and what to do if. Interestingly when you look at the same subject over several years and across all the magazines you got much of the same advice. It may have used the same words but merely in a different way. Some article formats were more digestible than others and needed more time and often were more a dissertation than a synopsis. I quickly established my favourite magazine and started to dismiss the others.

We will all have different reading tastes so will select accordingly. One aspect that I found consistently annoying was the adverts which came at you virtually at every page turn. In some cases, your eyes competed with the latest netting, cloches, frames, tools etc whilst trying to read the article opposite. It was a relief to get to the smaller classified ads in some magazines as at least you could quickly turn these pages.

Just as I was putting the magazines in a bag to return to the pavilion, I received another gardening catalogue. No not one of the many seed catalogues that I get quickly browse and dismiss to Room 101 but one that came with my ‘Nemaslug’ biological slug killer. 100 pages packed with every conceivable product in a one stop shop. I quickly realised what I already knew, that gardening can be an expensive hobby. Maybe I should file this little glossy for a rainy day or for when I win the Lottery.

I think we have enough magazines at our pavilion to answer every plot holder’s questions and provide all the needed tips for many years to come and, if needed, we can always go back to Dr David Hessayon’s bible.

Has the perception of allotments changed in the last few weeks?

There are many different perspectives of allotments, allotment folk and the value they provided to the community. Views will vary greatly, and some from outside may be far adrift from reality. The views of the value allotments give their plot holders will also differ by demographic and ethnic mix. But whatever the view held we must respect perception often trumps all.

Some views may be tainted by the length of waiting lists and in today’s instant gratification times, view allotments as elitist and plots unobtainable. Others may look through the gates and take the view that they often resemble a ramshackle shanty town. Others will look with envy at the fresh vegetables and jealously yearn for the good life. The perception will obviously vary significantly between rural and urban, suburban and inner-city sites. Some even see them as a sort of day care centre for the retired.

Over the years allotments have gone in and out of fashion. Often in times of hardship they attract attention, whilst in times of plenty and affluence they may lose that attraction.

As a result of the current Covid virus has perception of allotments changed?

One thing is very clear is that the profile of allotments and the benefits they offer has been raised. It may be increased column inches in the weekend broadsheets, or even the five-minute sound bite on TV but six months ago there would have been none.

Perhaps two things have helped to raise the profile. The first was the supermarket queues and the awakening that we as a society had become too dependent on the one stop shop, the perfect all year-round fresh food that knows no seasonality. When you start to add up the air miles and extended supply chains and things done to preserve freshness maybe you realise that there is fresh and there is fresh. The second profile raiser was the fact that allotments remained open all hours and even government ministers classed them as exercise. Later they were lauded as providing both mental well-being as well as physical exercise.

In areas of dense housing and where the shift from houses to flats often in the sky prevails, the loss of growing space or even meaningful open space is acute. Here in London’s Docklands we have the highest density of residential housing in Western Europe and everything new reaches into the sky in little boxes piled on top of each other. There is some open space but that is often managed by the estate to provide the lowest maintenance option and community gardening is rarely encouraged or provided.

It is ironic that allotments as we know them today are only some 100 to 150 years old. They were developed to provide, along with parks and libraries, a release from the industrial sprawl and to give householders a piece of land to grow on. Today the industrial sprawl has been replaced by concrete, glass and commercial and residential sprawl and yet we have less space than we did a 100 years ago or even 50 years ago. Some would suggest that we now have longer waiting lists and latent demand than at any time in the history of allotments.

I was once told by a Mayor of a borough that his colleagues were the problem and that they viewed allotments ‘as the lowest of the low.’ Well if there was ever a reason to change perception that was it.  Today even the hardest councils have had to keep allotments open and respect the benefits they give. Folk who thought gardening was something their parents and grandparents did have started to discover its many benefits and the closure of garden centres has in fact help raise awareness even further.

But perception must be changed and allotments have to continue to help that change happen. Allotments are integral to the community. They are environmental standard bearers, centres of both mental and physical well-being, educational stimulants, ethnic and social melting pots.

I often state to doubting eyes that only 28% of our plot holders are retired, only a minority are English origin and so on. These are small facts, but perception changes.

We do not judge the longest bean, the fattest leek, the straightest carrot. In fact, we celebrate the community outreach program we have and embrace environmental initiatives and projects.

Finally, I strongly believe that allotments do not stop at the fence and these physical barriers do not stop the allotments fully integrating into the community in many ways. Children may learn some basic gardening at school but where do we expect them to continue this after leaving school? Where do the disabled or long term sick go who are unable to physically manage a garden? How do we ensure social housing also has social gardening?

The city planners need to think holistically about the city-scapes they are responsible for developing and ensure that the various green and welfare needs highlighted by the current situation are not a lost opportunity. We can change not just perceptions but reality.