A course conceived, written, composed and presented by Charles Dowding, based on 38 years of vegetable growing.

• 18 lessons
• 58000 words
• 900 photos captioned
• 30 exclusive videos

You learn how to grow vegetables successfully and easily. The course is a distillation of my four decades of growing vegetables. I explain, illustrate and demonstrate the best methods I know for small and medium scale growing. I want all of your time and money to be invested in growing success.

My mission is always is to find time saving, cost effective, and productive-per-area methods for growing vegetables – throughout the year. Also to have vegetables in store so that there is always tasty and nutritious food.

This is what I share in the course.

Course content

I explain the skills and understandings you need, the essentials. My approach diverges sometimes from mainstream views because I assay and develop new or lesser known methods, for easier and better results. No dig is the main one, plus I give you a lot of short cuts, which are really just common sense. For more on this it may be worth your buying my first course about no dig gardening, but it’s not a prerequisite for taking this course.

Course 2 illustrates how you create planting plans, advises on succession and inter planting, how to propagate plants, and quick ways to set them in the ground. You learn spacing, picking methods, watering, and using covers for both warmth and pest protection.

The course advice is based on your having a clean and fertile area to grow vegetables. It may not be large and that is fine. I show examples of how much food you can grow every year in just one bed, and in containers too.

One technique I refer to often is interplanting and inter sowing. This is a form of companion planting, because seedlings like ‘nurse plants’ nearby, and plants generally like being close to other plants. Hence the success of multi-sowing, and there is a whole lesson on that.

The content is 18 lessons, totalling 58,000 words. There are 900 photos with detailed captions, and 30 exclusive videos which are not available elsewhere.

Where it leads

In the last lesson I consider how we can grow more easily, in tune with energy forces such as the sun, moon and others. I give easy and cheap tips for improving your harvests. There is much we don’t understand about how plants grow and how soil behaves, so an underlying theme of the course is to keep an open mind. Be prepared to try new things, even beyond what I suggest. This takes you further in how to grow successfully and easily.

The course is not accredited with official bodies, yet.

KEY to CONTENT   V means one of the unique videos, pics + photos and w = words, not including quizzes + there are other videos embedded which are also on You Tube

Module 1 Skills and knowledge 

1 Success in your gardening 1 The aim 2 How to succeed 3 Skills you need for top results V Spinach 10 months growth from one sowing +  V Sow at best time, 28pics 2200w

2 Fully use your time and space How to maximise growth, efficiently V Interplanting spinach and herbs + V Spacing and timing, small garden mostly,  44pics 2200w

Module 2 Plan for continual harvests

3 Sketch out the year Examples of my plans and successions for three beds V Wild rocket followed by decision time, result was cauliflower and chicory, 35pics 2200w

4 Succession and rotation How to plan for and succeed with new plantings throughout summer and into autumn, what can follow what V No rotation results + V Small garden autumn successions 45pics 2700w 

5 Winter gardening Growing and preparing for winter, and the harvests including during the hungry gap V Winter harvests outdoors + V Winter small garden, 47pics 2100w

Module 3 Perennials and herbs

6 Perennial vegetables and raspberries A growing manual of 12 perennial food plants, V December among Homeacres perennials + V July perennial fruit & veg, 55pics 4100w

7 Herbs How to grow and harvest and maintain annuals and perennials, from basil and coriander to sage and thyme, sow, care, prune, V Herbs, 40pics 2500w

Module 4 Propagate, sow, seeds

8 Seeds and sowing How to source, buy and save seeds with illustrations of my seed saving, V Lettuce harvests and seed saving,  50pics 3700w

9 Propagation The biggest lesson, packed with information on this important subject V July propagation and planting, 56pics 4300w

10 Multisowing why and how, many examples, a big timesaver and garden filler V Beetroot and turnip late spring showing growth from multisowing,  40 pics 2700w

Module 5 Planting and spacing

11 Close spacings How to do it and why this works so well, within reason, details for many vegetables,  V Spacings examples in July of different vegetables, 38pics 3100w

12 Wider spacings Many examples and explanations, see the results from small plants to harvests, V Kale 30cm plants in October + V Spacing a wide range of plants in the polytunnel in July, 36pics 2300w

13 Planting methods and sowing direct Ways to transplant and how to do it quickly V Interplant of August showing growth by October + V How to work out spacings with a dibber, dib holes and transplant, 44pics 2700w

Module 6 How and when to harvest  

14 Picking skills (1) when to pick for different vegetables, seasons, plant growth and harvest requirements V April showing greenhouse salads picked all winter + V chicory hearts in October (radicchio), 51pics 3300w

15 Picking skills (2) more on picking including discussions and examples of cutting, V cutting baby leaves + V Cutting frizzy endive in autumn + V picking salad leaves. 38pic 2600w

16 Small space growing Vegetables in containers, sacks, vertical and one bed, V Methods to support peas + V Small garden intensive planting October, 56pics 3500w

Module 7 Early growing, watering 

17 Early cropping and covers  Using fleece and mesh, their relative values and effects in different seasons, V Frozen vegetable plants in April then see their recovery on same day, 50pics 2800w

18 Water, frost, moon, energy How to water, what you need to know about frost and some of my ‘secrets’ of lateral thinking plus action, V Winter watering + V Effects of lack of moisture + V Soy & French beans, 60pics  4300w