The health and nutrition benefits of home grown produce are plain. Eating food as grown in season has special health benefits. Picking food ripe and ready to eat makes a real difference to both taste and nutrition. Picking it as you need it guarantees a freshness that cannot come when it is picked green, refrigerated and transported hundreds or usually thousands of km's. Taking the time to carefully balance your soil and promote biological activity will improve nutrient and phytonutrient value. You are in control.

And we haven't started to discuss the inestimable benefits of the exercise that gardening gives us! Or the blessing that spending time in the sun is to our neuro-endocrine system and thus our mood! Or the effect on the mind of time spent viewing and studying nature instead of man made artificiality and screens!

And one of the best things about a home garden is that you will always have healthy food on hand to feed your loved ones or to throw together for unexpected guests. Hospitality breeds community, something that is becoming a rare and precious commodity in our fast paced self-focussed society.