Is it all worth it ~ does year round gardening really pay?
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- čas přidán 3. 03. 2024
- When I priced the £58k harvest value I used Riverford organic prices as that was the best equivalent that I could find in our location. We wouldn't have been able to afford these prices, which is why I only banked half of our savings.
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I think all of this boils down to focus and direction. The spins offs of health and motivation plus the bonus of all the food production is wonderful payback. No brainer Steve 🤣
and despite that Nigel, lots of people question it : All the best - Steve
You are so productive,it's a joy to see and learn what I can,would investing in solar panels ,and battery storage,or solar and a pay in tariff,if you don't have already,look forward to your next upload
I could be a lot more productive, but I don't have much time for gardening, so I have to focus more on being efficient. I have solar already, they don't produce enough energy in winter to power the lights in winter, but they do in spring. Funnily enough I was talking to an installer yesterday about expanding our system, doubling the number of panels and adding a battery, but the wait list is 18 months!! : All the best - Steve
Besides the value in monitery terms, the benefits to mental health of a deep connection to nature, and the reassurance you can feed your family regardless of uncertain times in the wider world, brings a level of optimism and a strong sense of self reliance that is priceless. Cheers Steve.
Very true, but many people are put off by the cost of gardening, my objective here was to try and show that all of the benefits of gardening - especially year round - can have zero cost and maybe even a good profit : all the best - Steve
What an amazing hobby! It has such a positive effect on so many people, far more than just yourself and your lucky friends and family who get to enjoy all those delicious vegetables rather than the alternatives. I can't imagine how many viewers have been educated and inspired to grow more and are reaping the benefits on a daily basis of a healthier lifestyle.
absolutely, very purposeful and as you say and amazing hobby from most perspectives! : All the best - Steve
I started growing in 2016, didn't take it very seriously, just wanted to try but then in 2017 we had this shortage of lettuce and i remember asda and tesco and all the big supermarkets started to ration that you could only buy 1 or 2 ice berg lettuce per person or something like that. I took a serious offence at that, how dare these corporations tell me what i can or cannot buy for my money. That was when I started taking growing my own a lot more seriously and never looked back. For me it's not just the money, even if it was more expensive I would still grow at home because it's better quality, I know what went into it, where it is from, how it grew, it's clean, it's healthy, it's not shipped from the other end of the globe and I don't depend on arrogant corporations to feed me and my family.
Absolutely! Agree 100%. I am actually very pleased just how much food I can grow for myself. It is a great reassurance when money is tight, or you are under the weather or as you say, you just can't find the produce in the supermarkets, I only have to step outside and there is always something tasty to eat 😊.
I wonder where the person who left that comment lives. Maybe under a rock or something. We had unprecedented food shortages and difficulty to access in the past 3 years, then skyrocketing food prices. And there are still people wondering if it is worth growing your own. Gimme a break... 🤦
@patriciawaterman7280 I think some people think it's unachievable because they lack the basic skills and fail repeatedly. Like any hobby or change in lifestyle, it takes time to learn, practice and lots of patience. Perhaps that person had lots of failures and therefore couldn't see benefits? or wasn't happy with the cost of failure in money and time? I am sure if they had tutoring and enjoyed abundance as we do, they would be singing a different song.😊
@revvend , I quite agree, I started growing my own fruit and vegetables in 2020 so I didn't have to be reliant on those 'supermarkets' again!
@magpie1492 I think they were just genuinely interested
Steve that could not have been said any better just in pure enjoyment it's worth it it's a real passion a beautiful hobby and it's super healthy thanks Steve your really awesome friend absolutely love it
Thankyou 🙂
Inspirational (as I've said many times before 😄)
I am only dabbling at the moment, but getting so much enjoyment out of growing my own veg, I doubt it will ever pay for itself monetarily, but money isnt everything. The sheer enjoyment of watching seedlings pop up and actually grow into tomatoes is worth every penny, not to mention showing my grandson the compost bin, worms, harvesting potatoes for tea, eating strawberries straight from the plant - priceless 💙
I watch your videos and read your book and look at your blog and gain real inspiration.
Again, thankyou 🙂
Money's definitely not everything, but the context of the question was whether the investment in year round gardening, especially growing an abundance of fresh food year round was worth it financially. I'd garden too even if I wasn't making a big profit, but I wouldn't have been able to afford to grow the way I do if I wasn't making a profit out of it : All the best - Steve
I can never be fussed weighing and working how much the produce I’ve grown would cost me. But I do make a mental note when I’m in Waitrose and I see a bag of 2 organic leeks for £3! Always make me feel better about the compost bill this time of year.
And at borough market prices for ‘heritage’ tomatoes I must have easily grown 5 grands worth in a season 😂
I can’t either, I used a much simpler system which works really well : all the best - Steve
For me whether its financially worth it or not doesn’t really compare to the satisfaction of growing your own, the pure taste difference and the mental health benefits 👌
Absolutely, I would too, but I wouldn't be able to afford to grow year round if it didn't pay : All the best - Steve
I find one of the best benefits is that I can put some of the savings towards regularly getting better quality supermarket items for the things I do buy. I always imagine any workers thinking I must live an unhealthy lifestyle as I don’t buy fruit and veg apart from citrus and mushrooms generally!
Yes, that's a great point, it definitely allows me to buy organic and high ethical standard grass fed meat : All the best - Steve
We’ve only just run out of potatoes, we’re about to run out of blackcurrants, we still have onions and beetroot in storage. In addition we have frozen vegetables and canned fruit from last year’s harvest. I didn’t do so well growing over winter this year but I still have some food on the allotment. This year we did a pantry challenge in January and February and only visited the supermarket for a small amount of fresh fruit and some food for the grandchildren. Everything else came from our pantry. We saved money but also had a sense of challenge and fun as we made use of food that was hidden at the back of a freezer or adapted recipes if we didn’t have the ingredients in a recipe. I love growing food and bringing it home to be used.
It's good to challenge yourself for sure, it definitely makes life more fun. We have about 20 types of fresh food right now (a lot more varieties of course) and 6 types of veg in store and loads in the freezer (but we don't really freeze much) as well as a cupboard full of sauces, pickes and jams etc. A bit less than my target of 30 different types of fruit and veg, but we will soon be back to that as growth explodes through spring : All the best - Steve
Great to hear you talk with so much passion and hunger (pun intended) about the last 8 years. Thanks for the video! Loved it. Alex
Thanks Alex, nice to see you back making videos and hopefully your consultancy earnings will be funding a couple of nice polytunnels of your own soon! Either that or your CZcams revenue in a couple of years time : all the best - Steve
It’s always worth doing something you enjoy 👍
Absolutely, but I was trying to provide a broader context, financial, fun, meaning etc a lot of people don’t do things they enjoy because because they can’t afford to do them for example : all the best - Steve
Really well put Steve. For me there are certainly a whole complexity of benefits to growing my own.
Keep up the good work Steve your an inspiration to all
Hi Steve my name is marlon I've been in horticultural for more than 30 years..garden centres etc..and I can defo say you r the most efficient gardener I've ever seen..great ethics on this video.. well done..and keep educating people hats off to you..Nice one..
Thanks Marlon, not always efficient though, sometimes - like today - I can potter around all day and just enjoy the sunshine and being outside in nature, doing very little : all the best - Steve
Hi Steve I started grow ing tomatoes in UK when we had lockdown. Did not have a big garden.But you were a great help to me as I had no ideas about grow ing veg in the uk.Thanks for your CZcams.I have moved to a new house with a big garden and green house.still trying new plants and veg .
Thanks for the feedback Kathy, gardening helped a lot of us get through lockdown and to appreciate a simpler life : All the best - Steve
Steve, all hobbies cost money but growing veg repays us all in so many ways. I have nowhere near the amount of space you have but our small garden not only gives me great pleasure but supplies us with a huge amount of produce. I've not done so well this past winter but am already planning for next winter to cover any shortfall
That was my point though, gardening doesn’t have to cost money, it can save a huge amount of money, plus so many other benefits. I understand that it’s easier to make a big profit when you have more mouths to feed though : all the best - Steve
Hey Steve...its so nice to hear positive youtubers like you... really enjoying making videos and sharing your hobby with us! Please keep them coming, I've learnt so much from you, and undoubtedly much more!
You've almost pushed me to do my own channel! 😂
Let me know if you do Richard : All the best - Steve
Have been growing vegetables since a child, even when flatting had a large vegetable garden, parents always laughed at me, when first married husband, brother and sister in laws asked why, how 30 plus years later, some of them now understand why.
Husband enjoys eating the food, but he has a limited palate. He doesn't like different coloured vegetables carrots have to be orange, beans green or yellow, cauliflower white, cabbage green. Won't eat broadbeans, cucumber, watermelon, or zucchini but that doesn't stop me from growing them. He ate 1/2 a rock melon, after telling me he didn't like them. So will be trying to grow more of them.
Enjoy composting have all different sorts of experiments under way, using composting worms, household scraps, paper/cardboard, coffee grinds in 10, 20 and 40 litre buckets and bins, plus massive heaps using wool, sheep dags, other animal manure, old hay and composting worms again.
That's great, our favourite melon was Champagne water melon last year, but we grew Honey Dew and Cantaloupe too. I always try to have at least 30 different types of fresh fruit and veg every week of the year, but it's a bit of a struggle right now, we are down to 26, although I'm counting things like Red Pack Choi and Komatsuma as different types. In summer it's probably more like 60, so it averages out. I used to only eat a handful of veggies, but now that I grow them it's probably more like 60 : All the best - Steve
🐝Thanks for the great video 🌻
Great video. The element of sharing food with others is really important. With people struggling us gardeners are really lucky to enjoy growing and harvesting an abundance of fresh, organic fruit and veg- In my case I started in lockdown and cannot eat all the stuff I now enjoy growing- giving/ swapping food is another really enjoyable element to this great hobby. And it also pays for itself- I've had everything from gorgeous quails eggs to a tractor tyre I use as as a raised bed for blueberries. I've also learned what weird and wonderful surpluses other people have...
yes it's lovely. It's actually against our allotment site rules to give veg away or barter with other allotmenteers, but we sometimes ignore it ;-) : All the best - Steve
Of course it is worth it !
it might seem obvious to some, but probably only 1% of gardeners do it, which must mean something : All the best - Steve
I find your videos very interesting, as your perspective is on all-year growing. I’m new to gardening, so my focus this year is to build my greenhouse, start getting to know my local climate and getting experience sowing and starting plants indoors.
I have access to my backyard and an additional area for growing. The climate here in middle Norway is not really made for year-round production, but I would like to try. Perhaps growing in-doors, if the cost of heating mye greenhouse is too much.
There’s a lot of potential if you can use grow lights and fleece in your greenhouse : all the best - Steve
@@SteveRichards I’m definitely looking forward to experimenting. Thanks for the tips
I take it you pollinate your strawberries and climbing bean flowers rather than be reliant on bees etc.
French beans are self fertile and strawberries often pollinate fine with a breeze, but I’m giving the very early ones a bit of help, ie the ones that flowered last week : all the best - Steve
Hi, great work. Where and how are you selling your fruit and veg?
As I said in the video, we only feed our family, we don't sell anything : All the best - Steve
@@SteveRichards it’s just that you made reference to the proceeds paid for the greenhouse etc 🤔
We bank half of our food bill savings, that’s the money I’m spending on the greenhouse etc : all the best - Steve
I personally enjoy the break from once the garlic is planted in October through to March when I start sowing again, couldn't be arsed doing it all year round , winter salads last all winter in polytunnel until I'm sick of them 5 or 6 months of not sowing and caring for seedlings is welcome for me!
I quite often get that comment, but I've never had it from anyone who's actually spent a few years growing year round and put the time in to get good at it. Those that do, never look back because gardening in autumn, winter and spring is just so incredibly easy, by comparison with gardening in summer. Spring is especially delightful, because I've had all winter to prepare for it and summer is easy, because all the beds are weed free. So much of the food tastes better, there's few weeds, pests or watering. The gardens always look fairly nice, if not lovely, I save a fortune on my food bill and I just enjoy how little effort is involved, it's so easy and takes so little time that I crave the opportunity to do a bit more of it, hence the new greenhouse. There's the odd day when harvesting is a bit of a drag, but most of the time, on a crisp winters day, I'm in bliss : All the best - Steve
But is it worth it if you take into consideration your hours you put in ? Ie if you paid yourself a living wage ,
No one really pays themselves for their hobbies though, or maybe you do, but I will answer your question properly later
@@SteveRichards I only ask because that question was put to me & I didn’t have an answer so I’m intrigued. Sorry if you thought I was being rude, not my intention at all.
It's fine Sean, I'm one of the few people who don't mind talking about money in public. lets begin, gardening at a small scale is ridiculously inefficient, especially year round gardening and gardening for self-sufficiency. It's inefficient because there is so much setup cost to sowing, planting, pricking out, harvesting, travel etc that would benefit from larger scale. If I were trying to make money the last thing I would do is try and be self-sufficient, instead of growing 250 varieties, including ultra low value crops like parnsips and onions, I'd be growing 20 crops and only high value ones like salad onions, spinach and lettuce. Anyway all that said right now if I were selling my produce I'd be making about £11.20/hour of my time. Back in the lockdown period when I was working an extra allotment plot as well, I had more scale, so I was making £16.50/hour. However that was only 14 hours a week (I'm now doing 10 hours), if I were working 20 hours a week I would probably be making £25/hour. If your questioner is actually interested in making a living from gardening though I'd recommend doing something more than just gardening, make your garden beautiful and speak about gardening, make videos, write a blog/newsletter, write a book etc. That would easily push up your hourly rate to £50-80/hour, after a few years : All the best - Steve
Are you married Steve? Only no way would my wife let my hobbie take over the home let alone the garden too😆
I’m guessing you don’t grow almost everything she eats, for 365 days a year then? Yes I’m married and she loves it, it looks beautiful and she loves to watch everything growing. I do make an effort to make sure that beauty comes first at home though, the allotment looks horrible most of the time. We growing our front garden too, we have an ornamental kitchen garden there and she looks after that, she loves that everyone stops to chat and ask her what’s growing etc: all the best - Steve
I suppose it’s also worth pointing out that it doesn’t take over the house, just my den/office and the top of a wardrobe in a spare bedroom.
She also quite likes that my hobby bought her a car, a utility room, a store room, pays for all her holidays and a lot more
@@SteveRichards fair play to ya pal . Wasn’t having a pop or anything Steve was just curious .
Just trying to make clear why she couldn't be more enthusiastic : All the best - Steve