Exemplary Vegetable Garden

If you have been following the BBC Four series called Sissinghurst, you shall be aware about the National Trust's - and the donor family's - efforts to create a new, organic vegetable garden on the Estate. Its principal purpose is to supply the restaurant with a mainly self-sufficient crop of fresh fruit and vegetables. It extends to 3½ acres. The home farm is 259 acres in total.

I strongly support this idea. I feel that this is the way the Trust ought to go in as many properties as is feasible. Sissinghurst is in Kent, one of the mildest counties in the United Kingdom. What would thrive in Kentish soil, may not always be appropriate in other regions, viz. County Down or elsewhere in Northern Ireland. Perhaps unused walled gardens may suit this purpose admirably.

Notwithstanding that obvious fact, it should be possible to supply the Trust's restaurants in such properties as Mount Stewart, Castle Ward, Florence Court, Springhill and the Argory with home-grown produce; and I'm utterly convinced that this could be an excellent marketing tool for the Trust at its regional properties, as well as using surplus farmland for such a purpose.

Perhaps the National Trust head office, with Dame Fiona Reynolds, DBE, at the helm, have this aim in mind already. I do hope so.