Growing your own - is it worth it?

[Dave2002]

I have, over the years, tried to grow various things on a small scale - tomatoes, radishes, lettuces, strawberries and in the last few years potatoes.
Nothing very serious, and work and weather have prevented larger scale production. The success has generally been variable - mostly poor indeed.

This year I tried to scale up potato production slightly, with 5 bags of a variety of new potato which I wasn't sure of. These required quite a number of bags of compost, most probably costing £15 in total, which with the cost of the bags, plus the seed potatoes is likely to have cost £20 in total.

The yield, of what turns out to have been Anya potatoes is rather poor, with a modest number of reasonable sized potatoes, and many very small ones. The taste, however, is quite good.

Last week I bought a modest bag of Anya potatoes from Sainsbury's for £1. The potatoes in the bag are a reasonable size. Probably 3 or 4 such bags would more than equal my total yield, so from an economic point of view, growing your own would not seem to be a very good way to spend one's time and money.

However, we've not tried the shop bought potatoes yet, so possibly there would be a flavour difference, but in this case I doubt it.

There are some things which might be worth growing for taste reasons - such as tomatoes, and some which might be worth growing because of being able to have them at different times, but now with so many things being readily available in supermarkets it seems hardly worth worrying about that.

Unfortunately potatoes are a pain, as the compost cannot be reused for the same purpose again, though can be used for other non related plants. If I do it again next year, I'll still have to buy more compost.

So, why do it? For fun? For the experience? Despite this, I probably will!

[MrGongGong]

"Buy" compost ? .......

The weather this year means that many folks potato yields are very low
but other things are in surplus so eat more of those ..........

[jean]

Yes , I don't understand the buying compost thing.

The great thing about potatoes, quite apart from eating them, is that they condition the soil for you.

Otherwise, grow things that are not easy to find in the shops or are very expensive. This was a fantastic season for plums but I barely saw an English plum in the shops. Gooseberries and blackcurrants, if you can find them at all, cost eye-watering amounts for a tiny punnet. And have you seen what they charge for rhubarb?

All very easy to grow.

[aka Calum Da Jazbo]

..... ahem certain medicinal plants?

[doversoul1]

I think from the point of economy, growing your own vegetable is much the same as baking your own bread. It’s a nice thing to do if you like that sort of thing, and it can taste better than bought things.

However, if you are a serious green vegetable eater: serious both in taste and in quantity, growing your own is definitely worth the effort. For summer, broad beans, dwarf and runner beans, and there is a variety of mange tout that yields from early summer to the end of August. For winter, purple sprouting and curly kale are easy to grow and not so easy to buy in good quality. I grow endives and lambs lettuce for winter salad but these are time consuming things to prepare. One new vegetable with which I am very pleased is ‘podding beans’. They are easy to grow and the beans can be eaten fresh like broad beans in late summer to early autumn or harvested and dried for winter use. I know dried haricot beans are cheap but I think these taste much nicer. Talking about dried beans, I leave quite a lot of runner beans on the plants to let them mature. They also make very good dried beans.

Apart from this, I enjoy weeding the vegetables. It’s such a primeval human activity.

By the way, don’t bother with carrots if you have badgers in the area.

I don’t think buying compost is anything outrageous unless you are growing vegetable strictly for the purpose of saving money. Ground need to be nourished for most vegetables. Compost from your own kitchen waste is not much more than a feel-good factor. I have a very good supply of well rotted horse manure mixed with my kitchen compost but if you have no easy supply of manure, you need to buy prepared ompost.

[JimD]

I planted two small bags of seed potatoes bought at, of all places, Wilkinson's, and must have a financial return of approaching 1000%. Trouble is I didn't notice the variety, just shoved them in, on Good Friday of course. Maybe that helped.

Can anyone explain why my onions (grown from sets on the principles above, but fed a little with liquid feed) are generally smaller than those I buy? More powerful and oniony though!

[Anna]

This year I'e grown tomatoes, runners and dwarf beans. The soil here is very heavy clay so I use large tubs (requiring compost, mixed with soil for the beans) Where I lived before had good soil and I also grew purple sprouting (which is always expensive in supermarkets but grows like a weed) My neighbour has an allotment, one year he had enough sacks of potatoes to keep them, and his two grown up children, self-sufficient through the Winter.
For me part of the reason for growing is simply the fun factor, and being able to step outside and harvest and cook within minutes really tasty beans and toms. Another good thing about growing your own is swopping/giving away the surplus! So far this year I've had free cucumbers, beets, plums, courgettes and chard I'd be interested in dover's podding beans as I intend to try some new varieties next year.

[gradus]

I've often wondered about the cost-effectiveness of home veg growing too but for me the satisfaction of producing one's own food goes most of the way towards balancing out the argument.
Re spuds, early crops were poor but main crops are heavy around here from which you might gather that I am an allotmenteer and grow relatively little in shop bought compost. The La Bonotte spuds I did try in pots this year were mighty expensive (5 for £9.99) with pleasant but not outstanding flavour, however I now have a stock of good virus free seed for next year on the allotment where they'll be grown in manured ground.
Allotments - if you can find one - are the way to go if you want to show a profit from your veg growing.

[Flosshilde]

Like most here I'd say that it depends on what you are doing it for. There's nothing wrong in doing it for the 'feel good factor' (what's wrong with feeling good?), & growing your own helps cut down on what you buy from supermarkets, which in turn cuts down on what they are transporting, etc. It also depends on what type of garden you have or want & how big it is. Do you want a mainly decorative (ie flowers & shrubs) garden, or are you happy to have a mainly vegetable garden (which means predominantly bare earth during late autumn, winter & early spring). If it's the former there are lots of veg you can grow that are decorative as well - peas with purple flower & pods, runner & french beans (which were originally grown as decorative plants), cherry tomatoes, the various chards (ruby, golden, etc). You could try artichokes or cardoons which are splendid plants. Jerusalem artichokes are related to sunflowers & have similar (but smaller) flowers. Courgettes are also decorative - lovely yellow flowers, & you could have the yellow-skinned varieties. Espaliered fruit trees can go against a wall or border a path.
Potatoes take up quite a lot of space, but they are worth growing as the taste is far better than shop ones (which goes for most things really). You could concentrate on unusual varieties, liked the Pink Fir Apple, that you won't find in shops.

If you haven't got a biggish garden (& a biggish family) producing plenty of waste (uncooked) vegetable matter it's not easy making compost in any meaningful quantity - which doesn't mean that you shouldn't do it as it will reduce the amount of waste going to landfill/incineration (unless your council collects & composts it), & even a small amount is better than nothing. Try one of the plastic 'dalek' bins, or a wormery (which produce very good, if smelly, liquid compost).

Just a few ideas! I think if you approach it from the angle of better taste, & the satisfaction of growing your own, rather than being cheaper, you might feel that it's worth-while.

[Dave2002]

Potatoes take up quite a lot of space, but they are worth growing as the taste is far better than shop ones (which goes for most things really). You could concentrate on unusual varieties, liked the Pink Fir Apple, that you won't find in shops.

If you haven't got a biggish garden (& a biggish family) producing plenty of waste (uncooked) vegetable matter it's not easy making compost in any meaningful quantity - which doesn't mean that you shouldn't do it as it will reduce the amount of waste going to landfill/incineration (unless your council collects & composts it), & even a small amount is better than nothing. Try one of the plastic 'dalek' bins, or a wormery (which produce very good, if smelly, liquid compost).

Just a few ideas! I think if you approach it from the angle of better taste, & the satisfaction of growing your own, rather than being cheaper, you might feel that it's worth-while.

Thanks for the tip re Pink Fir Apple.

I have a friend who has done gardening and vegetables for many years, even while he was working. His garden is probably twice as big as ours, so he can do both flowers and vegetables/fruit. I don't know how he found the time, and our general consensus is that it probably wasn't economic, but kept him off the streets! Other friends have a much smaller garden, but following advice from one or two garden enthusiasts in their family, they have planted bushes - such as gooseberries, raspberries etc - the high value sort mentioned earlier. This might be one way for us to go in the future.

One of my uncles is still keen, and he may even still have an allotment. He produces enough potatoes and other vegetables to keep us going for a few weeks, whenever we see him. I think in his case he likes doing it, and the company of the guys down at the allotment is a definite bonus.

We do grow, and use, herbs, which I think can be both cost effective and give better flavour to dishes than bought ones I'm trying to expand in this area.

Oh - re the wormery idea - we had one once - and it produced magnificent fertiliser liquid for orchids. It also got rid of a lot of kitchen waste. Unfortunately there is a tap in it, and once when we went away the tap got set in the wrong position, so all the worms escaped. When we got back from holiday there were dead worms all over the kitchen floor. Maybe I should set this up again - if I can get all/most of the bits together. It was really good, and we might be able to site it somewhere useful. We kept the orchids going very well for quite a number of years, but when the wormery stopped the orchids were gone within a couple of years, and we haven't been able to sustain them again since.

Re using space effectively, potagers seem a good idea, and don't take up too much space, but there may be problems about where to site them. Most likely they'd do best in our garden in the areas we want to use for lawn or for flowers, and tucked away by sheds and under trees is probably not the best way to get good results.

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

Yes , I don't understand the buying compost thing.

It's quite fun to build your own compost bin. I've made 3 beehive-style bins - the one used by Tommy Walsh in Ground Force.

great thing about potatoes, quite apart from eating them, is that they condition the soil for you.

Not really. It's digging them up that breaks ups the soil.

[Flay]

I have managed to produce a solitary aubergine which is sitting looking at me from the garden. I must cook something with it, but what should I make to justify exterminating it? Perhaps a moussaka. Any suggestions?

[Dave2002]

I have managed to produce a solitary aubergine which is sitting looking at me from the garden. I must cook something with it, but what should I make to justify exterminating it? Perhaps a moussaka. Any suggestions?

I forgot to mention, we now have a very small harvest of strawberries (<10!) Ice cream topping perhaps!

Good luck with the aubergine. If you get some more vegetables, e.g peppers, courgettes, red onions you could make a grilled vegetable mix - maybe eat it with couscous - or another thing you can do with aubergine is to make up some whipped up egg, and coat aubergine slices with that - rather like French toast, then fry the slices. Quite a tasty snack.

[jean]

Not really. It's digging them up that breaks ups the soil.

No, there's more to it than that - it's always well-textured and crumbly before you even start digging.

That's my experience, anyway.

[umslopogaas]

Moussaka is the only thing that comes to my mind for aubergine, but I've just looked it up in my cookbook and they suggest ratatouille. You'll need a lot of other veg too, and this one seems to be a vegetarian one, but says you can add some meat as well. With the addition of some mutton, it sounds rather good.