An introduction to growing fruit and vegetables

This intensive full day course looks at growing healthy organic fruit and vegetables, looking at soil, no dig methods, composting, mulching, cover crops, creating beds, raised beds and hugelkultur.

Planning your crop sequences is important so Sally covers traditional rotations as well as alternative approaches such as polyculture and continuous cropping. This is followed by a session on growing soft and top fruits and coping with pests and disease.

Sally has long been interested in climate change. In recent years she has been looking at how we can make our gardens more resilient to the changes and this resulted in The Climate Change Garden which she wrote with Kim Stoddart. So she will look at ways of making our growng spaces more resilient.

Perennial vegetables have a key role to play in the climate change garden. Sally has been growing a wide range of edible perennials at Empire Farm for many years. She is currently establishing a new perennial veg garden and she will discuss the options that are available including forest gardens, edible hedgerows and meadows.

There will be a tour of the kitchen garden, one acre plot, greenhouses and allotments.

The cost of this course is £95 for the first person with a discount ticket of £80 for the second and subsequent person booked at the same time. The numbers on these days are limited to 10 people. The price includes all tuition, course notes, a copy of one of Sally's books, a light lunch and refreshments during the day. The day starts at 10 am, with arrival from 9.45 am. There is a final Q and A session and the course ends at about 4 pm.

Cancellation policy - you can cancel with full refund up to 14 days before the course. Short notice cancellations will be transferred to another date.