Jack's Gardening Adventures

Introduction With changes under way within Cuba and other countries attitudes to Cuba one can only hope that the gardening and personal health worlds learn from the achievements of the Cubans following the post 1990 crisis when imported foods had to be rapidly replaced by home produced produce. Five years ago we made a months visit to Cuba . Not to the international holiday resorts but to the inner city and countryside garden and agricultural areas. Fortunately we had the chance to meet many persons active in the Cuban Agricultural Revolution which in some ten years made Cuba almost self sufficient in the availability of fresh vegetables, fruit, herbs for natural medicines, and flowers. At the time we wrote up what we had learned which would be of benefit to Mediterranean gardeners and smallholders. As we often reflect back to that holiday we have dusted our original article for a wider audience. What we learnt is reflected in the development of our holistic/slow garden and some

Having recently given the garden shed a spring clean we thought it useful to share our ideas of the most useful products it houses. Products that over the past twenty years of gardening in Spain we have found the most beneficial in terms of reducing the strain of working heavy soils, pruning tough woody growth, daily watering of containers and the incidence of pests and fungal diseases. We wish all had been available and purchased the day we came to Spain! FORK AND SPADES The several broken fork and spade handles and misshapen fork prongs thrown away highlighted the inappropriateness of both typical brands sold both in the UK and in Spain. Although a fork and spade are less used in gardening here in Spain compared to the UK we eventually came across and purchased the Fiskars ergonomically designed products. Both have strong adjustable ( for height) metal handles. MATTOCKS Many of the jobs done in the UK with a fork or spade are done in Spain with mattocks. The range we us