Frost is the first thought when considering where to grow strawberry plants in your garden. They are very hardy plants during the winter, but are not so hardy when they burst into life in spring. Read more

Using the right tools really does make life in the vegetable garden a whole lot easier. I'm a little bit of a tool nut myself and do find myself gravitating towards the hardware shop to buy myself ... Read more

Fruit trees and bushes are planted in the garden with the intention of remaining for the long term, providing produce for many years. In return for this supply of fresh fruit they require regular f ... Read more

'How to grow gooseberries' is intended as a solid introduction to growing this relatively easy to grow fruit bush. For more detailed information on gooseberries please feel free to contact us, we ... Read more

How to grow bare root soft fruit In general and for the purposes of this article, soft fruit refers to soft skinned, juicy fruit borne on bushes or canes. Other types of soft fruit include straw ... Read more

Blueberries are high in antioxidants so widely regarded as a 'Superfruit' (whatever that is) but taking their health benefits apart they are also exceptionally tasty so well worth growing yourself. Read more

If your garden is anything like mine you've been reaping the rewards of the good weather with a fantastic crop of fresh vegetables. So much worked for me this year it was almost as if someone else to ... Read more

Raspberries are one of the most popular summer fruits and are very easy to grow. Different training techniques mean raspberries can be grown in gardens of any size and in containers.Preparation ... Read more

Q - My strawberries are in their 4th year growing in an outdoor bed; fruit has been very poor this year despite feeding them, what is going wrong?  Apart from the fact that this spring a ... Read more

Gooseberry Bushes How to grow gooseberries. Ranging from huge, juicy, red dessert fruit to tiny, sparkling, golden drops of sweetness, gooseberries are a great, easy to grow choice. This section al ... Read more

Blueberries are delicious and extremely high in antioxidants which is why it is regarded as a super food. Plants are easy to grow provided you use an acidic or 'ericaceous' compost. Site and ... Read more

How to prune Gooseberry bushes and currant bushes. Pruning fruit bushes can seem complicated but is, in fact, very simple. Many people are nervous about the process so leave fruit unpruned which will ... Read more

.Buying plug plants is the key to easy vegetable growing as veg seedlings already started cut out a lot of the tricky stuff that can put off a novice grower. New gardeners who haven't tried vegeta ... Read more

Mackerel sky Before we get going, here's a photo I took on Monday morning while out walking the dog showing a pretty 'mackerel sky' which, as you know, signals a change in the weather. The old sailo ... Read more

"How times have changed regarding the use of wild foods in our diet, since Wild and Free:  Cooking from Nature, written by my late husband, Cyril and I was first published in 1975.  Foragin ... Read more

I was over at the nursery yesterday morning (pinching a few trees to replace some of my ash that had to come down) and took a few photos as it all looked so bright and colourful. I must say that J ... Read more

Rhubarb is a very easy plant to grow. If you get the conditions right at the start it will be relatively trouble free for many years. It is a plant that looks fantastic in the vegetable garden ... Read more

I sometimes throw my vegetable garden a guilty look as I skip past it on my way to the fruit cage or down to look at my young apple trees. The vegetable garden, though not as glamorous, does the heav ... Read more

I mentioned a couple of mails ago that we would be adding a new flowering plant section to our website but as usual I am a bit behind. We have been growing some very nice nursery stock (available now ... Read more

As you know my top priority is keeping you happy so when I noticed a sunny spell outside the office window I sped over to the Quickcrop garden to take some photos. I was concerned, you see, that you ... Read more

Brace yourselves folks, we are now entering the busiest time of year in the vegetable garden. The soil has warmed sufficiently for sowing and planting out but has also warmed enough for weeds and gra ... Read more

I know marketeers (am I a marketeer? I suppose I am) always say they are very excited about the launch of a new product range but I am genuinely giddy about our new range of succulent plants. Th ... Read more

It is rare you come out of a pub with anything useful but it was a chance encounter in a local hostelry which led to a complete transformation in my garden. Poorly producing apple trees suddenly b ... Read more

If you read last week's post you will know we talked about adding wood ash around gooseberry plants. I had a couple of emails asking if wood ash can be used around all fruit (it can't) so thought we ... Read more

Preparing the garden for winter I know I mentioned feeding your soil in some detail at the end of August but it really is the best thing you can do for your garden at this time of year. Layers of or ... Read more

This might seem like an odd time of year to talk about irrigation, but if you are thinking of adding a watering system to your polytunnel or greenhouse then now is the time to get it done. Irri ... Read more

It might sound like a phrase from some futuristic sci-fi story involving androids and off-world colonies, but xeriscaping actually comes from the Greek word ‘xeros’, meaning dry. It’s the pract ... Read more

One of the key differences between growing plants inside and growing them outside in your garden is that indoor plants don’t benefit from rainfall. As such, irrigation becomes even more importa ... Read more

You might remember from a post a few weeks back that we are now manufacturing the fabulous 'Gro-Grid' weed control planting mat. We have the machinery set up in our warehouse and have been building u ... Read more

Why Plant Bare Root Trees? Everyone seems to be talking about trees these days and with good reason. They are one of the single most effective ways to take carbon out of the atmosphere and help ... Read more

‘You are what you eat and absorb’ is more accurate than the saying ‘you are what you eat’. More than 2,000 years ago Hippocrates stated that all disease starts in the gut, but we’re only now coming t ... Read more

Last week I filmed the first in a series of over 200 videos which will become the backbone of our new Quickcrop vegetable growers course. This epic learning experience will cover all the cr ... Read more

You’ve probably seen the word 'sustainable' a fair bit, but we wouldn’t blame you if you’re not entirely sure what it means. With the way it’s used, it can sometimes seem like another word ... Read more

Your Immune System The immune system is made up of a network of cells, tissues, and organs that work together to protect the body. It is a highly evolved series of defences designed to ... Read more

Whether you're moving into a new build or you're looking to improve an existing boundary that has deteriorated, the thorny (pun intended) question of fencing vs hedging is likely to come up. Th ... Read more

When it comes to polytunnel growing, there tends to be something of a consensus around which crops are reliable staples in a temperate climate such as in the UK and Ireland. Indeed you will have p ... Read more

Aphids are the source of much frustration in the garden. Also referred to as greenfly or blackfly, these small sap-sucking insects feed on ornamental plants and edibles alike. They can cause ... Read more

This March I am starting a new monthly update project which is centered more around what I'm doing in my garden. This is because it's easier for me to write but also I hope you find it more engagin ... Read more

Tomatoes are one of the most rewarding crops for the home gardener to grow, simply because their flavour is so much better than their shop-bought cousins. Tomatoes grown for the supermarket s ... Read more

If you were alive 144 million years ago, you wouldn't need to worry about providing winter food for wild birds because you would have been on the menu yourself. It might be hard to believe w ... Read more

‘French Intensive Gardening’. Sounds kind of daunting, who wants gardening to be intensive? Me, I like to do a little burst of work here and there and take it easy on myself. But you shouldn’t read t ... Read more

Vegan gardening has a lot of overlap with organic or no-dig gardening. However, the ways in which it differs are related to the principles of veganism itself. Veganism is a belief or philosophy ... Read more

So, the other week, I had an email from a customer asking for advice on what soil mix to use for planting fruit trees in containers. It was a simple question which should have resulted in a quick ... Read more