Let your children catch the gardening bug

Combine Gardening Week and Easter for a fantastic fortnight for the family.

It’s National Gardening Week and Easter is on the horizon. So what better time to encourage kids to give a helping hand?

Andrea Fowler is horticultural educator at RHS Garden Wisley.

She points out that attracting wildlife, seed-sowing and vegetable-growing are all sources of inspiration to young gardeners.

“Spring is definitely here so we can be seed-sowing and planting in earnest,” she says.

“If you’re sowing seeds with children, sow something that’s going to spark their imagination.

“Plant flower seeds which children will be excited about, like calendula. There’s a calendula called ‘Porcupine’ which is an extra spiky pot marigold. There’s also cornflower ‘Blue Boy’ and sunflowers, which

everyone loves.

“Nasturtiums are fantastic and make great container plants so you don’t need to have a huge garden, you can just grow them in a window box. Herbs are also great.

“If you’re growing veg with children, have a go with ‘Pink Fir Apple’ potatoes (a maincrop variety with knobbly pink skinned tubers of butter yellow, waxy flesh) or purple potatoes, purple beans and yellow tomatoes, which will get them interested.”

Attracting wildlife into the garden will also engage the children, so help them build a mini-beast hotel (although autumn can be a better time to do this when wildlife is looking to hibernate).

A simple bug hotel can be made from a collection of hollow stems packed into a plastic bottle with the end cut off. Several hotels could be placed in different positions such as on the ground among vegetation, fixed on top of a post, next to a wall, half way up a hedge, in a tree, under a bird table.

Grander bug hotels can be made by piling up a variety of materials into a tower, or making a wooden frame with a series of compartments and packing these with different fillings.

You could also help children make a bird cake, using fat, good quality wild birdseed, raisins, peanuts and grated cheese.

Just leave the fat in a warm place to soften, put the other ingredients into a bowl, chop the fat into small pieces and add to the mixture, mixing it together using fingers or a spoon. Put the mixture into a yoghurt pot to hang from your bird table or roll into balls to place on it.

“We need to get the next generation inspired by gardening,” Andrea says.

For more information about National Gardening Week events, go to nationalgardeningweek.org.uk.