Helping kids to save the world through Gardening

Gardening with children will almost invariably instill in them a love for nature and a desire to protect the natural world. They will also have a greater understanding of where their food comes from and what it means to eat seasonally. Even if you don't have a big garden - in fact even if you don't have a garden at all - you can still do gardening with children.  Here's 15 ideas to get you started:

 15 great ways to get gardening with kids

Gardening in a heatwave

I recently wrote a post explaining what all the effects of Climate Change will be and included this point about agriculture:

"Drought, flooding and changes in seasonal temperatures will mean farmers having to cope with either too much or too little water and increased levels of pests and diseases.  These negative effects on agriculture will result in increased food prices globally, food shortages and more famines."

As we bid farewell to the heatwave summer 2018, where temperatures rocketed and rain was almost non existent it seems like a good time to assess how one hot summer affected my vegetable garden at Eco-Gites of Lenault and consider how the heat will have affected farmers.

Why gardening should be on the National Curriculum

Before we moved to France I was as an Environmental Educator working with primary school children.  I covered a range of activities including gardening.  I helped the children plan, build and use gardens in their schools.  It was hugely satisfying work and the children loved what they thought was non school work, where in fact they were learning so much.  My work was outside of the National Curriculum and relied on head teachers realising how important this "work" was, especially as much of the area I worked in was very urban, with many children having limited access to gardens or outdoor green spaces.   Both then and now I strongly believe that gardening should be part of the National Curriculum as it teaches children so many important things.

Skills we must not lose

This image turned up on my Facebook timeline this morning.  I am sure it brought a smile to a good few people, especially if they had managed to rush to the shops before the bad weather hit and stocked up of loads of bread.  However when a friend posted on Facebook that they were baking bread, he wondered how many people were also doing this and how many do not know how to bake bread.

Image from Leamington Spa Courier

My Green Summer

I pretty much took a break from blogging this summer - partly I was too busy and something had to give and partly my internet connection was playing silly whatsits and was often so slow (or even dead) that it made working online almost impossible.  I am keeping everything crossed that will behave itself from now on.

So I though I would take this opportunity to share with you some of my green moments from the summer of 2017.  I'd love to hear what you have been up to too.

Family Time

The boys and Simon went camping in the UK for a while and when they were here we had some great times playing games such as Settlers of Catan and Molkky (Finnish skittles made from wood), visiting local landmarks including our favourite castle at Falaise (birthplace of William the Conqueror) and taking some lovely walks around the Normandy countryside.

Playing Molkky

Think Green - My Resolutions for 2017

As the sun sets on another year many will have thoughts of those New Year Resolutions.  Will it be to get fitter or maybe lose a few pounds?  You might want to save some money or bake more cakes.  I have made all of these resolutions and more but this year I am taking a very different approach ... please find below my Green New Year Resolutions for 2017:

Weekly Green Tips - 7 Tips to help you grow Organic Veg

Week 24 - Organic Vegetable Gardening Tips

Growing organic vegetables ticks so many green boxes - you get to eat the freshest of healthy, seasonal produce without any pesticide residues, there are no food miles and zero packaging ... and it's good for wildlife too.  What's not to like so here are 7 great tips to get you on your way to growing organic vegetables.

August Garden Round-Up

I am sure many gardeners will nod away in agreement when I say that 2016 has been a difficult gardening year.  For us, in Normandy, a mild winter was followed by a long cold spring (in fact we almost had no frosts until March and they continued through April) and then a summer that just took an age to get going.  This all meant a very late start to the growing season.  Usually by now I have been harvesting summer vegetables for weeks but this year I am only just reaching "glut time".  However I am not too worried and so long as we get a nice autumn with no early frosts (I have known them as early as September 28th) then with luck I will be OK - especially as some crops in the polytunnel are looking like being the best I have ever grown.

But first a few pictures from outside the polytunnel:

Weekly Green Tips - 7 Vegetables you can sow in late July/Aug

Week 17 - 7 Vegetables you can sow in late July/Aug

If you have decided rather late in the year that you would like to grow some vegetables or you find you have some gaps in your veg patch there are still seeds you can sown in late July and August.  At this time of year the soil will be dry so do ensure you water seed drills well before sowing and continue to give the seedlings plenty of water once they have germinated.  This blog post gives 15 tips for successful watering which you might like to read. 

Combating Potato Blight

There is no denying the Spring of 2016 has been both cool and wet which has meant I have been really late getting things going in the garden.  That said, so long as we get a good Autumn (fingers crossed) this should not be a problem and plants will simply be ready a bit later in the year - there is one notable exception to this though and that is my potatoes.   My potatoes went in late and now have succumbed early to the dreaded disease that is blight thus giving them no time to grow tubers of a decent size. 

So what is blight?  It is a fungal airborne disease that affects potatoes, initially killing the foliage and then passing down underground and affecting the potatoes which can rot to a black slime when stored.  If you  know your (Irish) history you will have heard of blight as it is the potato disease that caused the Great Potato Famine in the mid 1800's when it decimated Irish potato crops leading to an estimated million deaths from starvation and a further million peasants leaving Ireland to try and find a new and better life in America.

Healthy potato plants in the polytunnel

Tips for Growing Carrots

Fresh carrots really are the best and nothing you can buy at a shop or even a farmer's market will come anywhere near the taste you'll get eating a just-pulled carrot from your own garden.  They are not difficult to grow if you follow these simple steps.

Weekly Green Tips #2 - Get Growing

Welcome to week 2 of my Weekly Green Tips series.  One blog a week with 7 tips on a given theme giving you 365 ways to help make the world a better place.  Today I am looking at ways to help you grow some of your own veg.

Week 2 - 7 ways to get growing