Edible gardens look and taste good

These days there seams to be a shift in design requirements.

Often I amasked to combine a typical aesthetic garden with a producing garden. These briefs come from clients in urban and rural environments.

With more space comes greater ability to combine these two complimentary styles – or so you would think.

Designing productivity into a brief is not as hard as it sounds - if you know what you are doing that is.

COLUMN:

If the clients are keen gardeners and will manage their property themselves then you have to start with the fundamentals of good property management. Gardens need tools so sheds are a must.

Gardens make waste so a recycling area where composting and propagation can occur is also important.

These ‘functional’ areas are often located out of sight but close enough to be handy so they are properly used. Both rural and urban properties can accommodate these and be scaled appropriately.

Urban properties can produce a significant contribution to your annual budget or it can produce a soupcon of preferred delicacies for summer enjoyment.

From a generous raised garden overflowing with tightly packed produce to a herb or two dotted amongst the traditional plantings these are easy to do.

But did you know you can produce way more than just leafy greens?

Beehives can give you honey but also triple the size of your crop through pollination. Globe artichokes can look like a feature plant but can produce a flow of delicious crowns that can be the centre piece of a classy dinner party.

There are many fruit and nut trees that can be placed strategically among the garden plantings to blend in, to cast dapple shade at the height of summer and produce a bounty of sweetness.

There are many berries that can easily be overlooked as an ornamental shrub. Blueberries are an attractive bush making a great space filler while producing way beyond its weight. Strawberries also make great ground covers – helping keep weeds at bay.

Cabbages make surprisingly attractive additions to a mixed border too.

On a larger rural property you have the advantage of space, but unless you have the advantage of time it is pointless. The real joy of owning a garden is not in looking at it but taking the time and pleasure to get know your land to become intimate with it.

The more land you have the more potential it has to produce. If you can grow trees for nuts, fruit and timber in a decent quantity these will produce for generations. You will also have space for extensive vegetable gardening.

Creating a coppicing spinney on your rural property not only provides you with an enduring supply of timber fuel and building materials but also creates another natural ecosystem that has knockon advantages for the rest of your garden by creating a more varied biome with many more species of plants and animals.

Watch out for pests – but even some pests can become produce especially if you a rabbit pie once in a while. Whatever the size of your garden be sure to make it as productive as possible – know your limits and work within them to create a beautiful and productive garden.

Welcome to spring everyone.

PHOTO: MARION VAN DIJK/STUFF A garden shed is essential for larger gardens, and can serve for propagation as well.