GARDENS
Access for all
The benefits of gardening for our health are well documented, but just as we gain time in later life to do it, we can lose energy or mobility. Here’s how to keep on gardening – whatever your age or stage in life…
by LUCY HALL
If we could pop a pill called gardening, it would be hailed as a miracle cure. Lowering blood pressure and easing stress, boosting happiness, memory and gut health, burning calories, building bone strength, and giving us vital vitamins, endorphins and serotonin – it does all this while improving our surroundings and diet, as well as connecting us with nature. So what are you waiting for?
For many of us, it’s not the garden that is the barrier to these benefits, it’s the gardener. Just as we reach an age where we have more time for our garden, we’re experiencing back ache, creaking joints, arthritic twinges and more. All of which put a dampener on our energy and enthusiasm.
But new ways of thinking about gardening, and the development of methods and tools that take the strain out of the process, mean it has never been so accessible – whatever challenges you’re facing. Just ask Mark Lane, award-winning garden designer, author, TV presenter, campaigner – and wheelchair gardener since a car crash in 2000.