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Authors: Adam Goodfellow
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ourselves.
The only sense in which we found the horses to be naturally productive was in creating massive quantities of manure. This endless disposal problem, however, led me to a lifelong interest. Until that time I had never had any appreciation of plants and would just as soon have watched paint dry as visit a garden. It all began because one of the old boys from the local allotments came and asked if we would mind him taking some manure away. As we gathered it frequently to combat parasitic worms, but had nowhere to put it, we were more than happy to let him take all he wanted. This led to Nicole making a throwaway comment of similar magnitude to the one I’d made in Sensi’s first field a few years before.
‘I wonder where the allotments are? Perhaps we could get one, and grow some potatoes or something with all this muck?’
Within a year we had four, very well-fertilised allotments, producing dozens of varieties of vegetables, fruit, herbs and flowers, as well as billions of well-fed, happy slugs. At first, I literally didn’t know a radish from rhubarb. We set to work digging up the thick clay in a vain attempt to destroy the invading hordes of couch-grass and nettles, plastering chemicals on the insects and slugs that devoured most of what we planted. It was hard work, but when we had our first harvest of ten, fresh sweetcorn, it was all worth it.
We began to discover new ways of gardening, and eventually abandoned the traditional methods of soil preparation for a no-dig, organic approach. This did not come easy to Nicole, who had by now got into the almost endless task of turning the soil to knock back the weeds, which somehow always seemed to thrive more than any expensive, vacuum-packed seeds bought in the shops. We could almost hear the old boys tut-tutting as they continued their time-honoured practice of digging the heavy clay, while we would simply empty a barrow of nearly-rotted manure onto the surface of a bed, and sling a carpet over the top to stifle the weeds until spring, when we would lift off the cover to find abundantly healthy soil, ready for sowing, with the manure mixed in by worms who had been working hard all winter. The warm, dry micro-climate produced by our carpet mulch also encouraged beetles, who gradually reduced the number of slugs to a manageable level. Our favoured method in the end was to raise plants in biodegradable pots on the tiny windowsill of our one-bedroom flat, before planting them, pots and all, through holes in the carpets, using a bulb-planter. This gave us amazing results for much less effort. It was not the last time we would find that ‘alternative’ ways of doing things actually made the most sense. However, the old boys got the last laugh. They generally had wives back at home who would prepare a meal from the hard-earned fruits of all their labour. Nicole and I were usually so exhausted by a day riding, shifting muck, planting and harvesting, that if we had the energy to bring some produce back up the hill from the allotments, it would usually begin the long, slow process of rotting in our fridge, before eventually being taken back down to be composted. Meanwhile we would scramble to shove some bread into the toaster and a tin of baked beans into the microwave, to stop ourselves fainting from hunger. This was our contribution to nature’s never ending cycle of growth, decay and renewal, which, although immeasurably satisfying, rarely put a decent meal on our table.
And so it was that one afternoon, I came in from the allotment with a bunch of ill-fated, optimistic vegetables, to be told by a breathless Nicole, as she fumbled a tape into the VCR, that there was this amazing guy on TV. He could get a horse to follow him around without a lead rope, and put on the first saddle, bridle, and rider in about thirty minutes. They called him ‘the man who listens to horses’.
I sat and watched the first QED programme about Monty Roberts in stunned silence. It was
The only sense in which we found the horses to be naturally productive was in creating massive quantities of manure. This endless disposal problem, however, led me to a lifelong interest. Until that time I had never had any appreciation of plants and would just as soon have watched paint dry as visit a garden. It all began because one of the old boys from the local allotments came and asked if we would mind him taking some manure away. As we gathered it frequently to combat parasitic worms, but had nowhere to put it, we were more than happy to let him take all he wanted. This led to Nicole making a throwaway comment of similar magnitude to the one I’d made in Sensi’s first field a few years before.
‘I wonder where the allotments are? Perhaps we could get one, and grow some potatoes or something with all this muck?’
Within a year we had four, very well-fertilised allotments, producing dozens of varieties of vegetables, fruit, herbs and flowers, as well as billions of well-fed, happy slugs. At first, I literally didn’t know a radish from rhubarb. We set to work digging up the thick clay in a vain attempt to destroy the invading hordes of couch-grass and nettles, plastering chemicals on the insects and slugs that devoured most of what we planted. It was hard work, but when we had our first harvest of ten, fresh sweetcorn, it was all worth it.
We began to discover new ways of gardening, and eventually abandoned the traditional methods of soil preparation for a no-dig, organic approach. This did not come easy to Nicole, who had by now got into the almost endless task of turning the soil to knock back the weeds, which somehow always seemed to thrive more than any expensive, vacuum-packed seeds bought in the shops. We could almost hear the old boys tut-tutting as they continued their time-honoured practice of digging the heavy clay, while we would simply empty a barrow of nearly-rotted manure onto the surface of a bed, and sling a carpet over the top to stifle the weeds until spring, when we would lift off the cover to find abundantly healthy soil, ready for sowing, with the manure mixed in by worms who had been working hard all winter. The warm, dry micro-climate produced by our carpet mulch also encouraged beetles, who gradually reduced the number of slugs to a manageable level. Our favoured method in the end was to raise plants in biodegradable pots on the tiny windowsill of our one-bedroom flat, before planting them, pots and all, through holes in the carpets, using a bulb-planter. This gave us amazing results for much less effort. It was not the last time we would find that ‘alternative’ ways of doing things actually made the most sense. However, the old boys got the last laugh. They generally had wives back at home who would prepare a meal from the hard-earned fruits of all their labour. Nicole and I were usually so exhausted by a day riding, shifting muck, planting and harvesting, that if we had the energy to bring some produce back up the hill from the allotments, it would usually begin the long, slow process of rotting in our fridge, before eventually being taken back down to be composted. Meanwhile we would scramble to shove some bread into the toaster and a tin of baked beans into the microwave, to stop ourselves fainting from hunger. This was our contribution to nature’s never ending cycle of growth, decay and renewal, which, although immeasurably satisfying, rarely put a decent meal on our table.
And so it was that one afternoon, I came in from the allotment with a bunch of ill-fated, optimistic vegetables, to be told by a breathless Nicole, as she fumbled a tape into the VCR, that there was this amazing guy on TV. He could get a horse to follow him around without a lead rope, and put on the first saddle, bridle, and rider in about thirty minutes. They called him ‘the man who listens to horses’.
I sat and watched the first QED programme about Monty Roberts in stunned silence. It was
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