What are the benefits for your gut microbiota of gardening?

Our gut microbiota are the layer of friendly bacteria that line our guts. Evidence shows they may help us to reduce excess inflammation and reduce IBS, strengthen our gut junctions and prevent gastroenteritis, provide us with an additional energy source and may help help us regulate our blood sugar and appetite. We can boost our friendly gut microbes with probiotic microbes, such as those from the soil we expose ourselves to when gardening, and with prebiotics (the plant based foods we feed the gut). The more edible plant varieties we grow, the more diverse our gut microbiota. Gardening, and growing and eating lots of different types of edible plants, is thus a recipe for gut microbiota health!

What is the gut microbiota?

The gut microbiota is the layer of micro-organisms (such as bacteria) which line the gut in our digestive system (the stomach, intestines and our colon). These microbes are not disease causing, but instead, help protect us against disease. They stop bad disease causing bacteria (pathogenic) from attaching to our gut and causing infections, and they produce something called small chain fatty acids (SCFA) which we can use as an energy source (they give us energy). They also produce natural antibiotics and antimicrobials, helping to kill off bad bacterial strains and microbes and may help our bodies regulate its immune (defence against disease) system, stopping excess inflammation (needed to help us fight disease, but bad in excess) and reducing IBS symptoms and gut intolerances. A good gut microbiota is essential for good health.

How is getting a little muddy good for our gut?

Mud, soil, earth- is abundant in natural alive and decaying material. Microbes, including healthy and unhealthy ones, live and die in this earth. Whilst we need some hygiene, to prevent getting disease from too much bad bacteria, exposing ourselves to little bits of good and bad bacteria can actually strengthen our immune system. Our defence systems come into contact with the bad bacteria and learn how to fight it, helping us to become more resillient to disease. Our gut comes into contact with the good bacteria and they settle (they are probiotic- it injects good bacteria into our guts) in our gut, helping us to have lots of good gut microbiota. Getting a bit of mud under your nails or eating a bit of home grown lettuce with some soil residue left on it, can help you boost your immune system and strengthen your good gut microbiota numbers. In fact many supplement companies are now selling watered down soil (Google soil based probiotics or see here ) as a way of helping people strengthen their gut microbiota.

How does growing and eating lots of plants help?

Our gut microbiota eat what we eat. They live off the plant fibre carbohydrates in the plants we eat as their source of energy. Fibre is prebiotic (it feeds the gut microbiota). The more fibre we eat, the stronger the healthy gut microbes are and the more they (in a process called binary fission) divide (bacteria don’t have babies, one bacteria splits to make two bacteria) and make lots of new bacteria. So the more plants you eat, the more good bacteria you have.

It’s not just about the fibre content though. Bacteria, like humans, like a diverse and varied diet. They don’t get all the nutrients they need from one food. They cannot just be fed one type of plant over and over or else they get malnourished. They need plant diversity in the same way we need a balanced diet with lots of different food sources in order to get all the nutrients we need. Therefore, for a good gut microbiota, it is essential to eat as many different types of plant as possible. Growing and eating your own allotment, kitchen or garden herbs and spices, vegetables and fruit and edible flowers, can be a great way to increase the amount of different plants you get to eat. Plants like asparagus and artichoke can be expensive to buy also, but cheap to grow. Fresh plants contain far more nutrients than dried, but both are high in fibre.

How is gardening good for your mental health and how does this help your gut health?

When we are stressed, our gut microbiota suffer. We produce cortisol stress hormone which slows our digestion, giving our gut microbiota access to less food. Our slowed digestion (slowed gut motility) can result in constipation and food getting stuck in our gut and decaying (going off). Bad bacteria in the process are given the opportunity to grow and flourish. This can result in gut diseases (gastroenteritis) and our immune system becoming activated and triggering inflammation (where it detects and corners off all bad bacteria, viruses and fungi and foreign things in our gut or dangerous chemicals called "oxidative species" from things like too much UV light, excess red meat and refined sugars and ultraprocessed food). Stress causes inflammation. Gardening can help reduce stress, as evidence shows that being around soil and green things and in fresh air and with trees (the basis behind the phenomenon of forest bathing) is good for your mental health. Gardening stops stress and thus helps prevent us giving our good bacteria less food, prevent bad bacteria from growing in the gut, and help reduce gut inflammation.

What plants are best for the gut microbiota?

The best plants for your gut are those highest in fibre. This means often, the peels and skins of fruit and vegetables. So many people rob themselves of these essential gut aiding fibre sources, robbing their guts of the anti-constipating benefts of fibre, and their gut microbes of essential nutrients. Plants high in fibre include courgettes, beetroot, onion, sweet potato, squash, cabbage (especially when it is fermented in saurkraut or kimchi), cucumber (especially when it is pickled in gerkins or pickled cucumber), apples, bananas, raspberries, strawberries, kiwi, mango (skins especially), orange. Having a diet with as many different types of plant is essential, from humdrum carrots, peas and cauliflower to exotic okra, passion fruit, sugarsnaps, asparagus, artichokes and beyond. If you see a fruit or vegetable you don’t know the name of, try it for your gut health!

What about antioxidants in plants? Are antioxidants bullshit or real science?

Antioxidants are things that neutralise "oxidative species" that come from UV light, too much refined sugar (advanced glycated endproducts), ultraprocessed foods, too much red meat, too much alcohol, drugs and other toxins in the body. Plants are fantastic sources of natural antioxidants, especially those high in plant polyphenols (plant bioactives which have health aiding properties), vitamin E, C and selenium, zinc, copper, magnesium and manganase. Plants like herbs, spices, fruit and vegetables can help neutralise the oxidative species and reduce inflammation. As excess inflammation is bad for your gut microbiota, anything that neutralises unnecessary inflammation is good for your gut health. Get growing and eating your plants!

OVERALL?

Gardening and eating plants is good for you and the planet. It is good for your mental health, good for your physical health and also great for helping you strengthen those healthy good bacteria in your gut. Gardening for gut health!

COPYRIGHT LAURA CAMPBELL

Did you enjoy reading my article? I am happy to send you the research behind any of the claims I make in this article. I am a scientist FOREMOST. Do you want me to write for you or to help you with new product development or nutritional advice? I go ONLY ON SCIENTIFIC EVIDENCE and will not endorse products I do not believe in. I am vitriolic in my passion for preventing scientific misinformation based on unsubstantiated claims. Feel free to email me at [email protected] if you want to work with me or to connect with me at https://www.dhirubhai.net/in/lauracampbell007/

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