Not so steep learning curve

I started growing to show on a local level when I was 30 years old. At that time I was the youngest in my area by about 403 years and I have to admit I came up against a stony wall of silence when I tried finding out information from my fellow competitors, most of them dyed in the wool, grizzled old bastards who wouldn't give you the steam off their piss unless you paid for it. I recall asking one gladioli grower (who actually wrote for Garden News at the time) are you 'Mike Oxsmells' who writes for GN? He looked up at me over his glasses, issued a stout 'yes' and just ignored me. What a twat. On another occasion I enquired as to how a grower had achieved such a clean skin finish on his spuds. 'I grow them in peat' and that was it! I guess they didn't want some smooth-faced upstart coming along and gatecrashing the established order. They had earned their local celebrity and wouldn't give up their little secrets and concoctions to someone who had the audacity to actually ask them for advice! I could easily have given up, especially as I was just picking up a few place cards here and there and I couldn't understand how they could grow the same varieties to a much superior standard than I was achieving. However, I've always been a tenacious little tosspot and I did make friends with one of the top growers in my area, a guy I actually worked with, but even he could be an awkward twat at times and would take great delight in giving me snippets of information and leaving important details out for me to stumble upon myself by trial and error.

But I didn't get downhearted. Mainly because I enjoyed the banter at staging times as established growers tried the usual put-downs on each other (put-downs I now use myself) and I loved the smell of a marquee over newly-cut grass as the exhibits started to roll in. I would clap in admiration at presentation time as the usual suspects went to shake hands with the local dignitary, feigning embarrassment at their achievement. Eventually I started to win a few trophies myself and it was me that became one of the local 'superstars' and I spent the whole afternoon answering questions from members of the public and other growers who were just starting out themselves. (see gorgeous fresh-faced pic of me below from 1998!) I always remembered my early struggles to glean information out of other competitors and would try and answer all questions with as much knowledge as I had to hand at the time, even drawing sketches of oil drums and trying to show how holes are bored in sand etc. I realise now how little I actually knew at that time. Although this is a great hobby, sadly there aren't thousands of people wanting to become the king of their local patch so those that do need to be encouraged and helped along the way as much as possible...at least those that want to learn and will listen!

The point i'm trying to make is that when I started out there was very little written information I could turn to, the internet didn't exist and so the only time I could ask people would be at the actual show when it was invariably too late. If I had a problem I could only wait until showtime and hope that one of my fellow exhibitors would be kind enough to help me out. When I joined the NVS in the mid-90's they had a boring A5 bulletin that was sent to you each quarter and was about as much use as a chocolate teapot. I terminated my membership before the Millennium and carried on blissfully showing at local level, and gradually winning more and more. I always devoured each weekly Medwyn column in GN but i've said it before and I'd say it to his face, sometimes he doesn't quite explain things as clearly as I think he should for beginners to grasp, although of course he only has a limited amount of space and has to appeal to the more experienced growers also.

After yearly visits to Malvern I was still acutely aware that I still had huge strides to make and eventually I re-joined the NVS in 2003, but it wasn't until I joined their online forum in 2007 that I really started to motor in terms of the quality of produce I was benching. When I look back at some of my exhibits from just 3 or 4 years ago they don't come close to the stuff I grew last season, which in itself still has some way to go before I can start claiming tickets at the highest level, but the point is I AM improving little by little which is all you can really expect to do. I can log on to the NVS forum if I've experienced a new problem and get advice within a few hours and start solving the problem more or less immediately rather than having to wait until showtime as I did in the old days.

I was one of the first bloggers but now there are many of us doing it and there are lots of tips and snippets of information to be picked up from reading other people's experiences. This has lead to several growers fast-tracking their learning curve and I think we'll be seeing quite a few new faces winning at the highest level in the next few seasons, as illustrated by Owain Roberts winning the coloured spud class at last year's Llangollen National. Power to the people and the new technology at our fingertips but there's nothing like first hand advice so don't be afraid to ask at whatever show you are at. The NVS is all about education and helping growers achieve the most out of their produce so if you see a top NVS grower at a show approach him/her and ask them a question and I bet you the majority of them will be more than willing to give you their time. Those that don't.....wankers.