A plot holder at the allotments and his nurse sister have asked for donations of spare plants on Sundays starting today. These are going up to the Royal Derby Hospital to be taken by any staff who like gardening but haven’t been able to get compost, seeds or time so far this year to grow their own.
With our sessions not running, we’ve been able to donate spare tomatoes, basil and peppers grown from seeds, as well as lavender, blackcurrant, fuchsia and strawberry plants which all have a little history of who they came from originally.
My favourite history for these is Granny Rachel’s Fuchsias: Appropriately for the destination of these plants, Granny Rachel was a nurse during the Second World War. She rescued the ancestor of these fuchsias as it was being thrown out during the 1940s. Every year, she rooted all the bits that broke off the plants as cuttings in jam jars of water. She then gave the new plants to all her friends and relatives. Granny Rachel died a number of years ago, but her plants carry on giving happiness to an ever increasing number of people.