Secret Garden Anniversary

Today marks the fifth anniversary of Secret Garden! For those who’ve been reading this column from the very beginning, you might remember that I started with an article on Jacarandas on November 4, 2006. Here we are, 260 columns later, and I feel like my enthusiasm for gardening is stronger than ever. A bit of rain helps. A lot.

Back in 2006, our part of the world was in the grip of arguably the most severe drought in living memory. You’ll recall that Toowoomba’s three dams were rapidly decreasing to what became critically low levels, creeks that had never been dry turned into muddy gullies, and the landscape looked as though someone had flown overhead with a massive blowtorch. The place was drier than a Smith’s chip.

How the cycled has turned. During the drought, it was a daily struggle to keep vulnerable plants alive. Now with some moisture in the soil and perpetually full tanks, gardening is fun again. I’ve absolutely relished the opportunity to get in lots of new plants while the goings good, knowing that one day, drought will return. Hopefully by then, roots will have penetrated deep into the earth and we gardeners will be better prepared than we were last time around.

Of course a break in the drought hasn’t been the only change in five years. On a personal note, my wife Kylie gave birth to our second child not long before I started writing Secret Garden, and our youngest son Fergus was born in 2008. So I’m now gardening for five, instead of three. My love of apples led me to start a heritage fruit tree nursery in 2009, and just last month I launched a new website called The Radish. It’s about “edible gardening from roots to fruits”, and you’re invited to check it out at www.theradish.com.au.

Speaking of edibles, by far the biggest and best change in the gardening world over the last five years is the move toward home grown food. Vegie patches are springing up everywhere, and for the first time since World War 2, sales of vegetable seed are outstripping sales of flower seed. Not just by a bit, mind you, but by a factor of three to one. In anyone’s language, that’s what you might call a tectonic shift, and the best thing about the change is that it’s happened with very little prompting from politicians. The Grow It Yourself revolution is a people’s movement. It has developed for reasons that politics seems incapable of addressing, chief among them a desire for good, honest food and a primal need to get back to the basics of providing for yourself, your family and friends.

There’s no doubt we’re facing some serious issues at the moment. Global warming, rampant consumerism, peak oil and financial inequality are massive problems in need of solutions. But when it comes to the other elephant in the room – food – nothing motivates quite as powerfully as satisfaction. To sow a seed, watch it germinate, nurture the seedling until maturity, reap a harvest, and then cook and eat the food with family and friends is one of the most deeply fulfilling activities a human being can undertake. If the food is prepared well and tastes fantastic, all the better.

Thanks to Steve Etwell the rest of The Chronicle team for your help over the last five years. But most importantly, my sincere appreciation must go to you, the reader. It’s been an incredible privilege to write Secret Garden, and the thing that’s made the experience so worthwhile is that barely a week goes by without a reader saying something nice about the column. In fact, one self described non-gardener wrote to me a few months ago saying he reads the weekend Chronicle for two reasons – Secret Garden and the classifieds. That takes the cake. Thankyou all for your letters and emails. Your support is very humbling.

At times when writing Secret Garden I’ve been sitting behind my computer, wracking my brain for an idea with just an hour to go until deadline. Other times, the words flow quicker than the Condamine in flood. Could there be another 260 columns in the offing? Time will tell. The great British gardening writer Christopher Lloyd wrote his Guardian newspaper column for 17 years until his death in 2006 aged 84. I don’t expect to write Secret Garden until the day I die, but I do believe there is something new to learn about gardening every week and I’m looking forward to sharing my thoughts with you in the days to come. For now though, it’s time to get back out into the garden. When all is said and done, that’s where the real magic happens. Catch you next Saturday.

First published in the Toowoomba Chronicle 5th November 2011. Photo by Justin Russell, vegie garden at Thistlebrook.