'Tickle the earth with a hoe and it will laugh a harvest'.

Talented 'ticklers' in Ireland have broken free from the shackles of industrial food, heralding a new old-fashioned approach to food production. They inspire as they share the knowledge and skills to connect with nature at a deeper level and truly experience growing your own, maybe laborious but extraordinarily rewarding. Some successes are against the odds, as with the 8-Square-Metres blogger and a wonderful school garden in Dublin's Donaghmede. For a Cork grandmother and allotment-holder, GYO is a family activity, while a sense of community drives a thriving garden in Bundoran.

For Trevor Sargent, his town garden is a way of leading by example. Others featured are Michael and Ethna Viney; internationally-respected vegetable expert and author Joy Larkcom; OPW gardeners Brian Quinn and Meeda Downey; organic farmer Jim Cronin in Clare; author and professional gardener Klaus Laitenberger; Michael Kelly of GIY Ireland; Madeline McKeever of Brown Envelope Seeds; Tanguy and Isabelle de Toulgoët of Dunmore Country School; and champion of local produce and Michelin-starred chef, Martijn Kajuiter of Cliffhouse Hotel. For those who like vegetables to be the real champions, the teenage twin brothers, Micheál and Oisín Byrne in County Louth, compete for Ireland's Giant Pumpkin title.