I’ve probably penned 20 annual columns dedicated to gifts ‘for the green-fingered person in your life’.
If I’m honest, I struggle to recall a gardening gift I’ve received, let alone one I was grateful for. Like my music, I prefer to assemble my own garden paraphernalia, rather than have it given to me.
This understanding with my wife ensures there’s no Castlewellan Gold or begonias in my Christmas stocking – and no surprise tickets to endure Bruce Springsteen.
We gardeners are a diverse bunch with differing tastes. One man or woman’s wildflowers may be another’s weeds; that concrete cherub fountain that’s the centrepiece of your neighbour’s garden may well look to you like it was pilfered from a 1980s nightclub.
Therefore finding the right gift for a gardener can be difficult.
The Christmas gift recommendations I’ve made over the years can be broken down into three main categories: those slightly quirky, novelty-type ones that I think other people might be interested in; gardening gear and accessories I wouldn’t mind receiving as a gift; and stuff I have that I think every gardener should also have.
In the first category I’d include the likes of the GroCycle Oyster Mushroom Growing Kit that guarantees to foster your favoured fungi in 14 days. In a single box for around £25 you get the means and wherewithal to cultivate your very own gourmet oyster mushrooms – the ultimate in fresh, home-grown and sustainable produce.
For either the lady or the metrosexual man, try Nutscene’s Geranium and Spearmint Gardener’s Hand Scrub. All gardeners love getting their hands dirty but when we’re done for the day, we also like make sure our green fingers are clean. It costs around £15 for two small tubs but for your money you get crushed olive stones with natural exfoliating properties, plus olive oil, geranium and spearmint.
In the off-chance any readers are planning a seasonal gift for their favourite gardening columnist, these next suggestions are for you. A Vitopod Heated Propagator is what you get when you shift from being a casual gardener to a serious player. Starting off at around £140, these are the Rolls-Royce of their class, enabling you to create the perfect indoor growing environment for your seeds and cuttings.
Or what about a large Victorian-style terracotta rhubarb forcer? Covering rhubarb so the light it receives is limited, makes it come earlier and tastes sweeter. For around £100, you’ll get a traditional, handmade, frost-resistant product, which not only makes delicious rhubarb but looks classy too.
The three classic items from my own collection that I recommend are a tool, a pair of gloves and a book.
One mainstay of my quarter century in the garden has been the mattock. A digging tool favoured on the continent, the mattock combines the impact of a pick with some of the digging capabilities of a spade, yet used in a manner that draws the earth towards you rather than away and upwards – a technique known as ‘grubbing’. Shouldn’t cost more than £30.
I’ve only ever owned one pair of Felco gardening gloves and I ruined them doing building jobs they weren’t designed for. Costing around £25, they are Swiss-designed for pruning, each glove model (there’s 701, 702 and 703) coming with special technical features ideally suited to the ergonomic design of Felco pruning shears.
There’s a similar more recent book but I’ll stick with the original hardback of Derek Jarman’s Garden (around £20). With words by the late filmmaker himself and pictures by his friend Howard Sooley, this sublime study of Jarman’s Dungeness garden is a revelation and an inspiration.
