Sharing The Love – Of Horticulture: At Shipley Eco Action Gardens

Whilst private allotments are great for curating your own personal pastoral paradise there’s a lot to be said for shared growing spaces too. There you can meet other like-minded people, find out about their horticultural techniques, and be part of a strong local gardening community. 

Aside from being hugely positive for you as an individual, the benefits of shared gardens are really important for the future of veg growing as a whole. As a meeting place they’re excellent for promoting growing to a wider audience and for drawing in potential converts. It behooves us all to get involved!

Shipley Eco Action Gardens (SEAG) are an excellent example of what local communities can achieve in the promotion of veg growing. They draw in a vast and varied crowd of people with all kinds of interests. Some are dyed-in-the-wool horticulturalists, others have interests that are peripheral to growing, still more use the garden spaces for other pursuits – ‘Ecstatic Dancing’ anyone? The important thing is that visiting SEAG brings people into contact with horticulture and each other. It’s a marvellous endeavour. 

As you might imagine, the ‘Grow Group’ at SEAG are primarily focussed on plants. One of several gardening ‘clans’ on site, they devote their energies to sustainable, eco-friendly food production. The Grow Group’s goal for 2024 is maximum productivity and to achieve it they’ve brought in automatic irrigation and some innovative organic feeds.

Because the AutoPot Watering Systems adopted by the Grow Group require no electricity or mains water they’re absolutely ideal for use at SEAG. The plant-controlled responsiveness of the systems also helps maximise growth, fruiting, and flowering. This makes them a shoo-in for anyone who, like the Grow Group, is looking to create a productive garden. 

Sweet Million, Sungold, and Black Beauty tomatoes have been positively rampant in the SEAG polytunnel. These are planted up in ultra-compact AutoPot easy2grow modules which are ideally suited to vine crops and feature two 8.5 or 15 L pots per tray. Elsewhere cucumbers, aubergines, chillies, and Honeydew melons are thriving in 1Pot modules. These modules have just one 15L pot per tray but work brilliantly when growing different crops within the same system. 

The Grow Group also have micro greens, basil, and plants being raised from seed in Tray2Grow systems. The versatility of the Tray2Grow is a massive bonus at SEAG where space is at a premium and adaptability is a must.

Pak Choi, Broccoli, Squashes, Courgettes, Chard, and Purple Sugar Snap Peas are also being automatically irrigated using AQUAbox Spyders in raised beds. Here the same AQUAvalve-led principles apply but adapted to function in the ground.

In order to stay aligned with their organic ethos the Grow Group have chosen BioTabs to feed these hungry, fast-developing plants. Such fertilisers are a really interesting approach to low-maintenance, 100% organic growing. 

BioTabs come in the form of fertiliser pellets which you set into your pot, 5-10cm beneath the surface of your growing media. Each BioTab contains a rich, slow-releasing mix of organic nitrogen, bone meal, blood meal, feather meal, fish meal, and natural humic acids.

However, as with most organic fertilisers, it’s not just about the nutritional value. The beneficial soil bacteria in BioTabs also improves the grow media itself and contributes to swift and complete uptake of the fertiliser content. At SEAG the resulting uniform, healthy growth is plain to see.

The potential for further exploration, experimentation, and enhancement is vast with BioTabs. All manner of innovative but easy-to-use products are available in their wider range in order to compliment the principal fertiliser. In use at SEAG are a selection of the Dutch brand’s powdered or liquid organic soil conditioners, growth accelerators, PK and/or Silicon boosters, inoculants, and foliar sprays. 

Under the tutorage of Laurence Ritchie, AutoPot’s International and U.K. Sales Manager, the Grow Group have quickly come to embrace these new ways of growing. Best of all, thanks to SEAG’s extensive calendar of shows, fayres, and workshops, a large number of people from all sorts of backgrounds are getting closer to simple, effective, environmentally-friendly veg growing.