With his incredibly easy-going nature, approachability, and no-nonsense delivery, it’s little wonder that Ngāti Porou gardener Adrian Sutherland has become a social media sensation in the online horticultural world of Aotearoa and beyond—not to mention a bit of a Gisborne local celebrity. A fame that also comes with a few perks.
Seeds Sown
In 2018, Adrian Sutherland established One Minute Gardening, an ongoing catalogue of social media videos “that may or may not be interesting, informative or amusing”. Around 15,000 Facebook followers are proof that his self-deprecation may be misplaced, but that’s all part of Adrian’s charm as he welcomes viewers to each video with a massive smile and a “kia ora from the garden”.
“I’ve always been interested in learning about different things, and in recent years it has been gardening,” Adrian tells Verve. “But I always found it really frustrating watching videos on YouTube as the first 30 seconds would be jingles, and I’d get annoyed waiting for it, then the person in the video would take the next minute or two explaining what it is they’re about to talk about. I thought that if I ever I did anything like this, I’d try to make it as quick and painless as possible! I figured if I can’t say anything of valuable or be interesting or mildly entertaining on one minute, then, you know, I don’t want to waste anyone’s time as most people don’t have that much time to waste. So that’s how One Minute Gardening came about.”
“Every now and then people say, ‘Hey you’re that guy!’” he chuckles. “Mitre 10 have generously given me a couple of gift vouchers and Hansa were kind enough to gift me a mulcher—which is great because I’ve been doing my mulching with my mower and it’s been getting a bit of a thrashing!”
Adrian says that it’s the simplicity of his messaging that most appeals to novice gardeners and isn’t afraid to admit that he too has to still look things up.
“I try to reply to every single comment and always do my best to answer questions,” he says. “But sometimes if I don’t know I’ll point them somewhere where I think they might get a better answer than I can provide with my scope of experience.”
Adrian also adopts the Māori lunar calendar, maramataka, a practice that sees him tend to his plants, fruits and vegetables depending on the cycle of moon and its gravitational pull. The technique involves splitting the month into two—the first phase when the moon ‘grows’ to its full size, and the second phase when it retreats again. The organic gardener says that during the first half of the month, the moon uses vegetation almost like straws, sucking from the earth and drawing nutrients into the structures, creating the most optimum conditions for growth; while the second stage of the cycle sees the moon’s energy directed back into the earth towards the roots.
“I was always aware of the moon’s role in life because my grandparents, aunties and uncles would always be talking about it with regards to fishing and eeling as well as gardening,” says Adrian. “I’ve done a lot more research in recent years, and it’s fascinating to see how the moon not only influences the tides, but things like the water table.”
Growing A Community
Adrian remembers there being “a few tomato plants” around the place as a child, and his grandparents having a garden “on their bit of land”, but he certainly didn’t grow up in a green-fingered family in his Tolaga Bay community.
“One of the things that triggered my interest was a teacher called My Green,” he recalls. “He was a visiting teacher from the US who taught science and horticulture and at some stage he planted some broccoli seeds. When it was ready, we went down to the school garden to pick what was back then, to us kids, a very weird-looking vegetable, which we fried in a pan with butter above a Bunsen burner. It was absolutely beautiful—not of this world—and has stuck with me my whole life.”
Through his teens and into his 20s, Adrian’s love of growing plants and veggies (“and some plants which weren’t strictly legal!”) flourished, with greater influence from older friends and family who advised on the likes of “sheep pooh and seaweed”. Now, he beams,
“I love helping to grow a community of gardeners where people can meet online or in person and discuss things.”
it continues to be a real whānau affair, with his wife, Bong, also enjoying tending to her organic fruits and veggies, and their five-month-old daughter Lily Melody “hopefully getting her fingernails dirty soon enough”.
“We have a quarter-acre section that is more of an orchard and veggie garden, but the nutritional value that I get out of it is not as great as the personal value I get from it,” he says. “Being among nature, noticing the bugs and worms and being aware of the seasons—eating the produce is almost like a bonus.”
Another bonus from his agricultural endeavour is the community and camaraderie that have blossomed from his online channels.
“I love helping to grow a community of gardeners where people can meet online or in person and discuss things,” says Adrian, who also works for the Māori-Anglican Church, teaching folk how to grow food at home. “I find the simplicity of gardening at this time of my life so appealing. It’s just so enriching, pulling up some carrots to take inside for dinner, and I want to encourage others to try it, and to feel the same.”
Tips for Beginners for this Time of Year
Adrian reckons it’s a myth that people are born with ‘green fingers’ like most things in life (and quite literally when it comes to gardening), you’ve simple got to put in the hours and get your hands dirty. For those that don’t want to hold off until spring when “basically anything can grow”, he offers a few pointers for the colder months to get the gardening bug.
Go and get something that’s easy to grow like silverbeet or spinach that that’s easy to plant and nurture, rather than attempting to grow something from seed.
Grab a few punnets of your favourite vegetables and put them in pots or buckets with holes in. Add compost and water regularly.
Compost! Not only does it prevent a load of excess waste heading to the landfill, but creates a satisfying cycle whereby organic leftovers are used to create new life: “It really gives you a sense of contributing to nature, and working in harmony with it.”
Follow Adrian’s journey on Facebook or Instagram @oneminutegardening
