Landrace gardening

-taff

I might be very late to the party here. I already practice no dig gardening, I don't use pesticides, I do make compost and thanks to the hotbin, have leachate to use for feed, I grow bocking comfrey for feeding, I let weeds mostly have their say apart from ragwort. My front garden style is a mix of edibles and a lot of herbs with the odd decorative plant, like a heuchera [need more ground cover though, it's definitely bare in places] and my back garden is home to the pretties - geraniums - the raised beds for vegetables and the greenhouse for tomatoes. I have applied for a half plot as well to grow the bigger stuff there's no room for like artichokes etc.

I have just now found out about landrce gardenign, which, for the uninitiated, is basically growing what you want to eat, letting it all cross pollinate so that you get seeds and therefore plants suited to your particular ecosystem.

Does anyone do this?

LessImpecunious

Coincidentally, only just heard of it today - via https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2023/may/10/ditch-your-spade-forget-fertiliser-listen-to-the-weeds-alys-fowlers-guide-to-laid-back-gardening (with a link to a YouTube video specifically on Landrace gardening (the article has a wider focus) which I haven't yet watched). Interesting idea...

twopenny

I've not heard it given a name but that's the way it goes these days

I always used to create and save seed in the past (big garden) - had to buy new seed every now and then as it did weaken.

Minimal dig. That was just how things were done especially when  you are working.

Then came the new big thing of Hybrid plants so the seed wasnt made by the plants. It wasn't a huge sucess after the first flush.

Grew nettles and comfrey for feeding and 3 compost heaps.

Now teeny tiny garden I don't have enough room for more  than just about crop rotation in 3 small beds so leaving things to seed is an occasional thing.

But I grow flowers dense so from not even a fly in the plot to just about everything

-taff

hmm..I did have a huge garden to grow in but didn't really save seed when that was going. Now I have a smaller one, I think celery leaf was the only thing I let seed recently. I do save tomatoes every year though, had some Piglet Willie french Black for over ten years [thanks Zazen] but in the last couple of years that is starting to send out shoots from leaves..

I don't really have the space to save a lot of seed, most of my stuff just self seeds, the borage, love in a mist, aquilegia, etc , mostly flowers, because I leave it to do it's own thing. If i do get an allotment leisure garden, I might think about that then. Or completely rejig the back garden.