This week is National Allotments Week, an event which celebrates the amazing benefits and importance of allotments and accessible garden spaces for yourself and the local community.
The leading allotment organisation across the UK is the National Allotment Society (NAS), who work to ensure that allotments are safeguarded for public use, so future generations can continue to enjoy growing their own!
The theme for this year’s National Allotment Week is ‘Bugs, Bees and Broccoli’ with the NAS working in partnership with Buglife to acknowledge the importance of gardening with nature in mind.
To celebrate, we take a look at the top five benefits of allotment gardening:
-
Health and wellbeing
Gardening is a brilliant form of physical activity which helps encourage an all-body workout. It’s a great form of outdoor exercise for those who work a desk job or individuals who are looking for a ‘green gym’.
The physical exercise also helps contribute to your mental health and wellbeing, particularly with more of us working from home. A session at the allotment can be a brilliant escape for both body and mind!
-
Get closer to nature
Working on an allotment year-round helps you connect to the various species in your local open space, taking into consideration the birds, bees and butterflies which come and go seasonally. Local wildlife is also a brilliant natural pest control for those certain unwelcome guests.
With more and more of the population living in busy urban areas, allotments are a fantastic form of reconnecting with the natural world, especially for children. Helping your local patch thrive in turn helps the local wildlife in and around the area, as allotments can prove important green corridors and habitats for certain species like hedgehogs.
-
Connect with others
Whether your allotment is a shared or singular hobby, it’s a fantastic way of getting out and about meeting new and often likeminded people from the local community.
You’ll be talking to other plot holders all about your plans in no time, with others often sharing advice and extra produce within the collective group.
-
Grow your own seasonal fruit and veg
There’s nothing tastier and more satisfying than eating your own freshly grown fruit and vegetables!
Along with helping to reduce your weekly food bill, your locally and seasonally grown produce also helps cut down your carbon footprint.
-
Learn new skills and knowledge
Successfully preparing, cultivating, planting and maintaining a new or overgrown plot to produce fruit and vegetables takes a lot of skill and knowledge.
There’s also a real sense of achievement when your first seeds or plants successfully produce an edible crop ready for the cooking table!
Looking to find out more about applying for an allotment near you? Click here
Based in Wales and looking to brush up on relevant horticulture skills to help implement in your allotment? Our partners at Tyfu Cymru regularly host fantastic horticulture specific workshops and events as well as training programmes. Find out more here.