Original subtitles

BIRDSONG

Hello, welcome to Gardeners' World,

and welcome to a rather wet, soggy Longmeadow.

It rained very hard overnight, which is great for the garden -

really, it needs it - but the roses don't like it,

because not only do they droop and cower under the weight

of the water, but also it does mean that the petals get soggy

and fall off, and makes deadheading doubly important, not just to keep

the flowers growing, but also just to try and add a little bit

of respect back to them.

And, of course, the reason you deadhead is to stop them

setting seed, because any plant, when it sets seed, is going to

divert its energy from making new flowers.

So, the more you deadhead, the more that new flowers will appear.

And there's plenty of life left in these roses yet,

so it's time well spent.

Coming up on today's programme,

Carol visits Cothay Manor in Somerset

to get inspiration from their beautiful borders...

One of the most fascinating things about this garden

is entering these secret little rooms.

They're really intimate and lovely,

and they're packed with marvellous plants.

..and Arit visit RHS Wisley,

where she discovers that the gardener's traditional foe,

the slug, actually might be the gardener's friend...

So, this is the leopard slug. They're really helpful slugs,

in that they actually are quite territorial

and aggressive towards other slug species,

so they have been known to attack and kill other slugs, occasionally.

..and I shall be preparing my biennials

for a really good display next year.

There's a real sense in the garden

at this point of year

of seasons evolving,

and what we have is one season ending, with the plants that were

at their best at the end of May and throughout June,

and another beginning, the late-summer flowers,

and as a gardener, what you have to do is say,

OK, we've had one performance, that's finished.

Time to clear that away and create room, create opportunities

for more planting, and also improve the health of the garden.

And, quite frankly, to tidy it up a bit.

And as far as tidying goes, the first plant I've got here

is an aquilegia.

Now, aquilegias are completely beautiful,

and they seed themselves all over the garden,

and I definitely wouldn't want to be without them.

But once they've finished flowering,

they don't die very gracefully.

So now's the time to cut them back.

Get in there and cut right back to the ground.

So, they can go. And you can see that hiding underneath there

were some ophiopogon.

So they'll get a little bit of light now.

Essentially, that's a tidying-up process,

but there are other good reasons to cut back plants

at this time of year.

The lupins have been better this year than I ever remember them,

they've just been fantastic, and their flowering season

is late spring, early summer.

And, really, by the end of June, they've done the stuff.

So, these two need cutting right back down to the base.

Remove everything above ground.

This is not going to harm the plant at all.

It'll quickly regrow fresh foliage,

and it means that its energy

is going into the roots rather than producing seed.

Now, it's not just lupins that you can give this treatment to.

As your delphiniums stop flowering,

cut them right back to the ground.

And it's the same with Oriental poppies.

And the great thing about poppies and delphiniums

is they very often will flower again.

Sometime from late August through September,

you'll get a second showing. It's never as vigorous as the first one,

but it's certainly worth having.

That tends not to be true with lupins, though.

You're unlikely to get new lupin flowers, but you will get

attractive foliage.

Right, before I take this to the compost heap,

I've got one more to do.

Hardy geraniums are absolute standbys in the garden,

but they don't all flower simultaneously,

and they don't all flower all the time.

The earlier ones, like Geranium macrorrhizum,

like Geranium phaeum,

will have done most of their flowering

and be developing seeds.

But if I cut this right back hard,

that will come back,

and very quickly, it'll produce fresh foliage with fresh flowers.

And that will let light and air and moisture in, and the plant

will be a lot healthier as a result.

The final reason why it's important to keep cutting back plants

that have finished their performance,

and whose foliage is starting to die back,

is that, in weather like this, when it's wet and still quite mild,

it's the perfect conditions for fungal problems to get established,

and also the perfect hiding place for slugs and snails.

Cut back the foliage and it gives you that opportunity to plant

into the spaces, because nothing is going to perform

right across the growing season.

So, you need to add to it and adapt

and follow the flow of plants as they grow.

Now, to get inspiration for this, the best thing you can possibly do

is go and visit a beautiful garden, which is what Carol has done,

a Cothay Manor in Somerset.

For us gardeners, it's a real treat to get out and visit grand gardens

far and wide.

Although Cothay Manor is a garden on a great scale,

nonetheless, it's divided into all these smaller sections -

garden rooms, if you like.

But even this garden room is bigger than most people's gardens anyway.

But within it, if you look carefully here and there,

there are all manner of ideas.

Take this one - just three plants involved here.

First of all, there's this beautiful kniphofia.

Its stature is magnificent, these great big heads.

Beloved by all sorts of pollinating insects, too.

And then, bringing up the rear, is Acanthus mollis.

It is just so architectural.

But then, in the background, you've got this little accent.

It's a miscanthus. It's called Morgenlicht - Morning Light.

And it's got really beautiful foliage that accentuates

these other two plants.

These are grand plants,

but they would look absolutely perfect in a small garden.

One of the most fascinating things about this garden

is entering these secret little rooms.

They're really intimate and lovely,

and they're packed with marvellous plants.

But this is what's really caught my eye,

not because it's bright and vivid,

but because it's this most beautiful combination

of two glorious plants, both Asiatic.

This one is Kirengeshoma palmata.

It's a delight, with these lovely round buds

and then these long, pale-yellow flowers.

And if you look closely into the centre of it,

this beautiful little climber, Dicentra scandens.

And if you trace it back,

it's climbing way up over this obelisk and right up

into the yew, with these glorious sort of golden droplets

just dripping from the foliage.

So elegant.

All around Cothay Manor are a series of beautiful pots.

This big pot occupies a space that's the focal point

for all sorts of different views,

and it is so simple and yet so effective.

It's dramatic, and it just uses one plant.

It's an argyranthemum called Jamaica Primrose.

Incredibly easy to grow.

Very, very simple to propagate.

You can just take little short cuttings right the way through

from March through the summer.

And it's a good idea to do that, because then you've got

guaranteed plants for the next year, because this is a tender plant.

But whilst it's flowering, there's nothing like it.

It will keep on producing flower after flower after flower,

providing that you make sure to deadhead.

When you do, take the spent flowers down

to where you can see the next embryonic buds developing.

That way, you'll ensure a wonderful show of flowers

right the way through.

In this little garden room, the predominant colour is green.

There are splashes of vivid colour here and there,

and of course there are hundreds of different hues of green,

but it's green nonetheless.

So, how do you achieve that kind of interest and the sort of excitement

that they've got here in this planting?

Well, by thinking about things like form and texture,

by thinking about scale, too.

And leaf shape - really, really important consideration.

So, here you've got a gorgeous,

great big Salvia involucrata.

And then next to it is Sinacalia tangutica,

here in bud, with very divided leaves.

And when these flowers are finished, it leaves behind these feathery

little seed heads at the top.

And then there are bits of ferns creeping through here -

the royal fern. But below, on the floor,

is this dainty little maidenhair fern.

It's almost like a frippery, a little edge,

and it's on an entirely different scale

to all these giants towering above it.

And it's that that makes this a really exciting corner,

and one that anybody could try and transfer to their own garden.

On a corner is this delightful planting.

It's formed, really, by three plants.

First of all, you've got this lovely clematis. It's herbaceous,

so it will die right back to the ground each winter.

Now, earlier on, it would have been smothered

with these little bright-blue flowers, Turk's-cap shaped.

But they've given way now to these silvery seed heads,

and what seed heads they are, too. They're exquisite.

And then here we've got this lovely miscanthus - Morning Light,

soft and silvery, and the perfect backdrop for this.

And then how about this for a statuesque plant?

This is Echinops ritro, the globe thistle.

First of all, these globes of flower are silver,

eventually they become blue.

And there's a reason for that.

Bees and other pollinating insects can perceive blue very easily,

so when these flowers are ready to be pollinated,

they become blue. And then, eventually, those flowers fade.

And what you can do if you've got the time and inclination

is just to take each one

and just rub off the old flowers,

like that, making it quite pristine again,

and not damaging that seedhead at all.

The birds will still be able to enjoy it all through the winter.

Well, how romantic is this?

This great long alley.

One plant used all the way through,

billowing catmint.

And then, at its centre, a focal point -

a unicorn.

Well, we can't all have this in our gardens, of course,

not on this scale, but it can inspire us

to use that whole idea of symmetry

that brings this feeling of peace.

It may be an extremely tranquil, peaceful garden,

but when you leave here, your mind's going to be buzzing with new ideas.

I really like the combination we've got here

of the geranium - Ann Folkard -

with its vivid magenta, and this rose, with these small

but very intense red flowers.

And playing with colours is the most creative aspect of gardening,

and I absolutely love it.

But sometimes you just have to be humble and accept

that nature does it better than ever you possibly could,

and that has happened here in the Jewel Garden this year,

because, remember we took out the box hedges that lined the paths,

and what has happened as a result is we have a rash of lovely poppies

that have grown exactly where the box hedges were.

And the reason for that is that poppy seeds germinate

in response to light.

And when we first made the Jewel Garden back in 1997,

we scattered poppy seeds to fill it up,

and they in turn dropped their seeds,

and when we planted the box hedges the following year,

the seeds would have been buried under the roots of the box.

So they've stayed buried for the last 24 years.

And the colours are glorious.

They fit in, they add energy and dynamism,

and they're a complete joy. So I'm very happy.

That is a lovely accident.

Now, we've been sent a film from a young couple

who started a garden from scratch,

and they've recorded the first few years,

which they're sharing with us.

Hello, we're Hattie and Matt,

and welcome to our garden in Cambridgeshire.

It's an new-build plot, and we've been here about two years now.

When we first moved in, the garden was just turf,

so we quickly set about digging some beds

and put up a wooden trellis so that we could add more height

to the garden for our hanging baskets and our climbing plants.

So, this is our Mediterranean bed.

We've got lots of Mediterranean herbs in here, too.

We've got rosemary, thyme, sage.

We've got lavender as well. And it's the hottest bed,

so this gets really dry in summer, but it does quite well.

The garden attracts lots of wildlife,

and we see many beetles and bees,

just like this one enjoying the flowering sage.

We've also seen an increase in visiting birds,

and we think this has helped by our new small water feature.

It's a washing-up bowl sunken into the ground

with a solar-panel water fountain.

We grow edible plants, such as hops for brewing beer.

And here they are climbing up the trellis,

entangled with the clematis, enjoying the evening sunshine.

We also have some vines that we can grow for wine grapes.

We've actually made wine out of these.

Here it is.

This is about two years old now.

It's awful.

Thank you for visiting our garden.

I'm grinning because I love Matt's honesty about his home-made wine.

Now, I've got a tray of sweetcorn,

and I'm going to plant these out now.

In fact, the key thing is that they must be planted in a grid.

Now, there is a reason for that.

It's because sweetcorn is wind pollinated,

and what that means is, if you plant them in a row,

the wind can go across the row and blow all the pollen away

from the neighbours, so you end up with no cobs at all.

But if you put them in a grid, whichever way the wind blows,

it's going to spread the pollen to other plants,

ready to be pollinated.

I reckon I can get three across this raised bed.

In principle, the wider apart they are,

the more cobs that you'll get off each plant.

So, these are about 18 inches,

which should give me a couple of decent cobs per plant,

and maybe even a third smaller one.

And bury them slightly deeper than they've been growing in the pot.

That will not just anchor them better,

but also increase the root growth.

This is a variety called Swift,

which is noted for being exceptionally sweet,

and because these grow fairly tall and fairly thin,

sweetcorn lend themselves to intercropping.

Traditionally, squashes were grown with sweetcorn and beans,

but I'm actually going to add some lettuce in here.

I've got a red cos lettuce

that I'm going to plant in amongst them.

And the whole point is, I want these to be quick.

I want to harvest these before they get shaded out.

And that means that I could plant them quite close together,

because I will harvest them fairly small.

Now, one of the floral crops

that span 1,000 allotments across the country

are sweet peas.

It's amazing how often you see them growing amongst vegetables.

But for all of us who grow sweet peas, if we're honest,

there is a slight element of luck about their success.

Some years are good, some years are bad, and we're not quite sure

what we did to make that happen.

So, we thought it was time that we went and got the advice

of a professional sweet pea grower, to find out how to grow

great sweet peas every single time.

You can just forget the world when you're in the sweet peas,

just tying them up and looking after them.

It's...it's lovely.

It's everything about them - the way they grow, the way they perform,

the heartaches they give you.

I'm Derek and we're in Stowe-by-Chartley at my nursery.

I'm well and truly hooked.

I have now got what's commonly known as sweet-pea-itis.

Living and breathing in sweet peas all of the time.

I collect anything on sweet peas -

pottery, books, postcards.

You name it, I collect it.

It gets into your blood.

My grandad was a gardener, a full-time gardener.

My dad was a full-time gardener at one stage,

gardening at the big house.

And I'm a full-time gardener now and have been for many a year.

And my son now, who's in the business, is the fourth generation.

You can't beat having the family around you.

First time I saw plants was with my dad.

He always grew one row of sweet peas.

He used to say, "Let's see who can get the one

"with the most flowers on."

Of course, that gives you the incentive,

and it's from that that I've loved sweet peas and I've grown

sweet peas all my life.

Well, there's about 50 types of sweet peas that are available.

The one that we concentrate on more than anything is the Spencer.

We've got about 2,500 of those on the go at the moment.

The Spencer varieties developed from a pale pink,

wonderful frilly flower, and it's from that flower

that all these Spencers have originated from.

If anybody is starting to grow sweet peas who hasn't grown them before,

Gwendoline is an excellent first choice. It is brilliant.

This is a lovely pink, and a long stem,

with four well-placed florets on it.

As you can see, all the florets there. It's lovely.

It is exceptionally good for cutting.

One of the things that happens with sweet peas is that they shed

the buds when the conditions aren't correct for them.

Now, this could be cold weather, it could be hot weather,

it could be just a thunderstorm which causes it,

and they'll drop the buds.

But one thing you must never do with sweet peas, especially

in the hot weather, is water them from the tap.

So, with a hose pipe or something like that. The water is too cold.

They shed the buds to protect themselves.

This is excellent for bud drop.

It doesn't hardly ever drop its buds.

That's why it's top of the classes.

Sweet peas come in all sorts of colours and shades.

Kiera Madeline really has got a good perfume.

It's absolutely magnificent, that is, yeah.

That's called Lisa Marie.

That's been bred by ourselves

and it's been named after my daughter.

I haven't called a sweet pea "Derek" yet.

There hasn't been one good enough, has there?

HE CHUCKLES

This is Allan Hodgson.

It is an absolutely cracking sweet pea.

An excellent pea for people for starting off with.

It comes on long stems, well-placed florets,

and the colour is ideal for mixing with other colours.

Now, the good thing about this is, if you want to grow sweet peas,

this is one you can grow outside very, very well.

It's weatherproof, shower proof and it doesn't mottle up.

This cream sweet pea is lovely, it's almost yellow.

Just a good cut flower, that is - Doreen.

Now, yellow is the Holy Grail of sweet peas,

and we haven't got a yellow and we...

It isn't in the genes of the sweet pea,

the Spencer sweet pea,

but if anybody can breed one and get one out, give us a call.

But if we get a yellow one, it'll make me very happy

that I have a nice yellow sweet pea with my name on it.

Anybody can grow sweet peas and anybody can hybridise sweet peas.

It's dead easy and it's a lot of fun.

You need two parents - say a pink or a purple -

you put them together, and that's how you get your new variety.

You go into the bud stage on something like this,

open it up and you'll pull all those little yellow bits off.

Like that.

Let's cross it with a mauve one.

We'll take a mauve flower that's fully out,

because the pollen is now soft like talcum powder.

And we're going to put the pollen on to the stamen there.

And that's now fertilised. It'll set seed.

You take the seeds out, you put those in the ground individually.

When they come to flower,

you're going to choose whichever colour you want.

You keep taking the seeds from that variety

that you've got growing there, you grow it on for the four years.

That's the new variety you've created.

That's the job done.

Growing sweet peas can be done two ways.

One is like this, which we call cordon method.

Let everything grow so it sort of bushes out,

till it gets to about this height and then you'll strip it back down

so that it's got one runner on.

You have to take all the side shoots out

and as long as you've got two side shoots coming,

you leave those in -

that way you'll get an excellent cut flower every time

with a long, straight stem.

Now, if you don't want to go to that trouble,

you can grow them bush fashion,

which is where you leave all the side shoots

and the tendrils on, and it just bushes out.

You'll get decent flowers on to start with,

but cordon method, you get a stronger, longer bloom.

It's brilliant.

The tendrils have to be removed also, as the sides shoots.

The tendrils are these curly...curly bits on the end there.

You just take them off at the end of the leaf,

and that's it, because all the goodness that's going in

to produce these tendrils is going into the production of the flowers.

So you can imagine every leaf on here has got a big fat tendril on,

cos they do grow like that if you let them.

If you're doing them bush fashion, you don't have to take them off,

but it does help the flowers if you do.

A tip for watering is to keep the ground moist at all times.

One of the best tips I can give you

is that when you're feeding sweet peas,

you don't feed them until they start to show flower buds.

And once they start showing flower buds,

you feed them with a high-potash feed.

So hopefully those tips will give you a good chance

to have some wonderful sweet peas, then, during the summer.

I think I knew, but I never really took in,

that there were no yellow sweet peas.

Of course there aren't.

But what we do have yellow is yellow rattle

because, a couple of years ago, I decided to turn

this little two-foot-wide strip along the base of the hedge

into a mini wild flower meadow.

But the one thing that you absolutely need is yellow rattle.

And it's this plant here, and it's got these lovely seed heads.

And the reason why it's called yellow rattle

is because, as they dry, they rattle as they move around.

The whole point of it is that it's parasitic on grass.

So where you have lots of yellow rattle,

you don't have lots of grass,

and that lets in all the wild flowers.

Now, it is happening.

This was a couple of years ago, so this is year two.

We've got lots of yellow rattle.

Things like the wild carrot are beginning to appear,

and the flowers will soon be out.

There's red clover, which is also setting seed heads -

very different to the yellow rattle, much more fuzzy.

We've got sorrel. We've allowed that to flower.

Sorrel is a very close cousin of dock,

and I've cut the seedhead of that off,

cos we don't want those seeds to fall.

And the whole point of it, of course, is you have fabulous plants

for bees and other pollinating insects.

You have cover for small mammals and reptiles.

And even if you do it just one square metre in your garden,

there is a huge benefit to wildlife and quite frankly, to you,

because it's lovely.

Still to come...

Arit visits RHS Wisley to discover more about

some of our most vilified wildlife.

So tell me about this guy, the black slug.

So they will damage some of our tender plants,

but they will also feed on a lot of rotting material,

so they can be good, but they can also be a little bit bad.

And I will be sowing some biennials for next summer's display.

But, first, we're going to a viewer's garden in Bingley,

where things have gone truly wild.

Hello, I'm Johnny, and I'd like to show you round the garden

that we've just let go wild this year.

So this was a lovely tailored lawn, which this year we've just let grow.

Cut a path through, we've got the apples, a plum tree.

And just by letting that grass grow,

we've got some absolutely gorgeous vetch that's come out in swathes.

Just beautiful.

We've just let plants plant themselves.

And this one in particular we love.

Just a wild rose that's popped itself in the wall.

Absolutely lovely, and it smells gorgeous.

Just let the plants decide what they want to do.

It's almost like...

..curation, I suppose, for want of a better phrase.

Just seeing what comes through and deciding what we want to keep,

rather than really thinking about what we put in in the first place.

So hopefully you can see that you can let your garden

just do itself, and we're really enjoying it -

both the fact that you get so much wildlife coming in,

but also the fact that it's actually really low effort.

I have a feeling that Johnny is being unduly modest

because it actually takes quite a lot of gardening skill

to create a garden like that.

He says he curates it. Well, he does it very well.

And this new approach to gardening, of balancing what is truly wild

and what is carefully controlled, I think is very exciting.

And a good tip,

if you want to make your garden look a little bit looser and wilder,

is to grow some rambling roses as opposed to climbers.

Now, behind me is the rambling rose Rosa multiflora Carnea.

And, about five years ago, I decided to put about a dozen ramblers

up the apple trees here in the orchard,

and very quickly they got established.

And rambling roses always add a sense of exuberant wilderness

to any garden, because they're pretty uncontrollable.

You can train them, but they don't want to be trained.

They just spread and arch and loop,

and then, for about three or four weeks in summer,

are a mass of these small blooms

that froth and spill all over the tree.

Now, they flower on last year's wood,

unlike climbing roses, which flower on new growth.

So the time to prune them is immediately after flowering,

which for most of them is July or August.

Also, a lot of climbers flower a second time,

whereas ramblers tend not to. This is their one performance -

it's fabulous, it's loose, it's wild and then it's over.

RAIN PATTERS SOFTLY

The new greenhouse has really come into its own this summer.

Now, in pots, I've got chillies.

And one of the keys to their success, I've learned,

is to focus on the plant rather than the fruit.

Get a nice, big, healthy plant and you get lots and lots of chillies.

Now, if you're short of space, and some do grow tall,

you can tip them back. This is De Cayenne,

which is one of the ones that we sowed together earlier in spring.

And what you need to do

is just take it back by no more than about a quarter, above a side shoot,

and just cut it off.

Now, that will encourage the side shoots to grow much more strongly

and they will bear the fruit.

So you get a nice strong, bushy plant covered in fruit

that you can fit in to whatever space you've got.

Now, Padron, which I hope some of you sowed too,

you can see is a big plant

and is already developing plenty of green fruits.

And the whole thing about Padron chillies is,

by and large, they're not hot at all.

Just occasionally, you come across one with a little bit of poke,

but that will spice up your life.

But they tend to be green, although they will turn red if left,

and they are absolutely delicious.

So I'll harvest some of those.

I do feed these every week and I use a liquid seaweed,

but a basic tomato feed will do the job perfectly well,

and that will encourage the formation of lots of flowers,

and therefore lots of fruit.

And a combination -

if you've got a greenhouse or a nice sunny windowsill -

of sun, heat, water and good food, you'll get a healthy plant

and masses of chillies.

The other thing that is absolutely ready for harvest is the basil,

and wherever you find tomatoes being successful,

basil will grow well too.

And it's a really good plant for tomatoes,

cos it does ward off whitefly.

They grow very well together as complementary plants.

And, of course, they taste fantastic together on the plate.

You can see these are really big individual plants.

And what we'll do is take off at least half, if not two-thirds,

of each plant and then strip off the leaves to make pesto.

And if you haven't grown any basil yet, it's not too late.

Sow some seed now, prick them out, grow them on.

Aim at getting nice, strong individual plants

and you can have your pesto harvest round about the end of August

and into September.

I've been growing cucumbers in this section of this greenhouse

for the last few years,

and this section is where the mist propagator is.

There's a heated bench, so it means the temperature in here

is always warm, it's always humid, and that's what cucumbers like best.

I've got three fruits on here, ready to harvest.

This is a variety called Merlin,

which is better grown indoors than outside.

And if you're not sure whether a cucumber is ripe or not,

the end is a pretty good guide,

because the more round it is, the more ripe it is.

If it's still pointed, then it won't be ripe and ready.

Do keep harvesting cucumbers.

Don't try and get them as big as possible.

As soon as they're ready, harvest them,

and then new fruit will be formed.

And I would expect that this container,

which has got three plants in it,

will be productive for another four weeks at least.

Now, I think that all of us who garden

will find that it's a great source of mental wellbeing

and, at times, of solace.

But, just occasionally,

the garden becomes a place of much more profound healing than that.

Hello, my name is Lucy and I live in Buckinghamshire

with my husband and my two children,

and I wanted to tell you a little bit about our wild garden.

In 2019, we lost one of our daughters to cancer.

And, ever since then, gardening has been huge for me

and so important for my mental health.

And we're really lucky to have a big plot.

Whenever things are getting a bit too much,

it's always the wild garden I come back to.

Our bluebells still look incredible,

and now are being accompanied with this amazing cow parsley,

and forget-me-nots and primulas.

And we've also started a wild area of poppies

which I've been growing from seed, lots of different varieties,

as that was our daughter's name.

When we moved in, we found this had been a bit of a dumping zone

for old boxes and metal containers and all sorts,

so I've actually repurposed a lot into growing vegetables.

And, funnily enough, one of the best things I've found that's worked

is old council recycling paper tubs.

In the autumn, we cut all this down

and removed it all and gave it a good raking

and put wild flower meadow seeds down for shady areas.

So I have everything crossed for this summer

that this is going to be filled with wild flowers.

It is my happy place,

and I'm so lucky to have it.

Thank you for sharing your garden, Lucy. It's lovely.

Now, my broad beans are getting covered -

or at least the tips of them are - with blackfly,

and I guess yours are, too,

because there is scarce a broad bean in the land

that doesn't get blackfly on them,

round about some time from mid-June to mid-July.

And that's because the aphid has a life cycle

that coincides with the broad beans putting on a spurt

of soft, sappy growth, and it's the sap that they're after.

Now, the conventional way to deal with this

is simply pinch out the tips.

If you remove the tips of the broad bean,

that doesn't give them the food that they want

and they will go elsewhere.

But, actually, there is another way to look at it,

which is to work with the aphid.

Now, when it comes down to broad beans,

there are techniques for reducing the problem,

even though you won't eliminate it.

The first is to sow beans in autumn if you can.

These were sown in October, overwintered in pots,

and planted out in March, and we've had a big harvest off them already.

So in no way is this reducing our bean harvest.

You could also sow round about the middle of May, early May,

and that means that there won't be enough soft growth

for them to feed on when they come out, and just accept that,

even though they might be reducing the size of your broad beans,

they're not affecting the beans themselves.

And they are a part of the life cycle -

there are other creatures, like ladybirds and some birds,

that feed off them.

So you're never going to get rid of them - they're not a pest,

they're just life in your garden.

And learning to live with so-called pests is clever gardening,

it's the intelligent way to go.

And this applies, believe it or not, to slugs and snails as well.

And Arit went to RHS Wisley to see how they are learning to live

with slugs as a companion in the garden,

rather than as a disaster.

If I told you there were some creatures in our gardens

that could help improve our soil, eat all of our rotting plants

and be a food source for our wildlife, do you know what they are?

Gastropods.

Also known as slugs and snails.

Who of us can put our hand on our heart

and say we haven't cursed them, hunted them at dusk,

and disposed of them in ways we wouldn't want to share?

It's not surprising we dread slugs when we consider the figures.

With 40 species of slugs in the UK, the average garden

might have around 200 slugs in a square metre of soil at one time.

That's a lot of picking slugs off your plants at midnight.

So I've decided to take a different approach, I'm much more relaxed,

and realise that they are part of the ecosystem of the garden.

It's time to set the record straight.

Imogen Cavadino, an entomologist at the RHS,

has been researching the habits of slugs

and their plant-chomping abilities.

I'm very impressed by your selection of slugs here.

I thought we'd be rummaging around in the...in the background here.

Yeah, if we did that, we would probably be there for quite a while,

trying to find the slugs at the moment,

because it has been so dry.

Can you tell me about the biology of these slugs?

Slugs are pretty fascinating.

They're not symmetrical like humans, they're actually asymmetrical.

So, for example, if you look at this one here,

you can just about see this hole opening

on the right-hand side, at the front here.

That's actually the breathing pore,

so this is where they'll breathe from.

And also right next to it will be the genital opening,

where their genitalia will come out when they're mating,

but also where they poop from as well is in that area.

Is that where the mucus comes out from as well?

So the mucus comes out all over the body.

It's really important for any slug or snail to be nice and sticky,

to stay nice and wet, and it's also how they move.

So they'll produce this sheet of mucus and glide over it.

Is that where the eating occurs, though, Imogen?

That's the really key bit.

Yeah, so the mouth is at the front of the slug's head.

And within that mouth, there's a tongue-like process

known as the radula,

which is covered in thousands of tiny, tiny teeth.

And it uses this a bit like a cheese grater,

in that they'll stick it out of its mouth,

scrape it along the surface

and scrape the material into its mouth, of whatever it's feeding on.

So they'll do things like taste

through the sole of the foot and the mouth.

But also they do seem to have some kind of sense of smell,

but it mainly seems to be through taste itself.

Of all the species of slugs in the UK,

almost 30% eat plants and animals, over 10% are solely meat eaters,

and many of the rest eat plants and fungus.

So tell me about this guy, the black slug.

I mean, that's the one that's really synonymous in the garden.

So there's actually about four or five different species of these.

Most of those species are omnivorous,

meaning that they'll eat absolutely anything.

So they will damage some of our tender plants,

particularly seedlings, things like that.

They seem to be quite attracted to those,

but they also feed on a lot of rotting material.

So they'll feed on dog poo, is a classic one to find them on as well.

So they can be good, but they can also be a little bit bad for us

as well, as gardeners.

Probably the worst offender is the netted field slug,

and they contract to a little white blob,

so they're quite easy to overlook.

But they probably do the most damage to plants in the garden.

What about this one?

So that one there is one of the gardeners' friends, actually.

So this is the leopard slug, it's probably well known

by some gardeners already because they do have this reputation

for being quite aggressive and territorial towards other slugs.

So they have been known to attack and kill other slug species

within the garden occasionally.

But they also feed just on rotting plant material,

so they're a handy slug to have around,

cos they shouldn't be attacking your plants.

But you've also got a close relative of theirs,

which is the green cellar slug.

It's quite commonly found around compost heaps,

and they just feed on rotting plant material

and also fungi, algae and lichen, so they can be really helpful

and an important part of the garden ecosystem.

It's natural we want to protect our precious plants

from the real slug culprits,

and we gardeners have certainly tried.

But how many of these methods have actually worked?

Now, the RHS has been doing some research to see

if the barriers we use against slugs and snails have been working.

Horticultural grit, bark mulch and eggshells - the ones that we love.

But the research so far has shown they don't really have any effect.

Now, there's a little bit more work being done on wool pellets,

so the jury's out on that one.

And the copper rings -

in the laboratory, they did seem to work,

and we're not sure if the reasons for that

are because there's a chemical reaction

or whether it is conductivity.

But in a garden setting...

Those little slugs and snails, they are not stupid -

they know how to get under the ring.

So if you were going to use those,

you'd have to have quite a deep ring go into the garden.

There are other controls out there, like slug pellets,

and those that have got metaldehyde in them

have been withdrawn from sale -

they are toxic and are damaging to wildlife.

So even if you've got them in your cupboard,

I would not advise that you use them.

On those prized areas of the gardens, like the vegetable plot,

you could use nematodes, and they're like a microscopic worm.

It gets put in water, into the soil and they will kill some slugs,

especially that one, that tiny one that does the most damage.

But they're not very effective against snails.

There are other ways we can prevent a slug attack,

like choosing plants for our garden with more care.

Take this euphorbia, for example - its really poisonous sap

is something that they avoid completely.

But you could also look out for plants that have a more hairy leaf.

The tellima is a great example of that.

And those plants that have a more oily base in their leaf,

like geraniums.

Now, make sure that any plants you're putting out in your garden

are not too young, because it's that tender stem

that slugs and snails can really chomp off

and razor down overnight.

My top tip is to choose a sacrificial plant, something

like a nasturtium, plant that out, and let the slugs and snails

really enjoy those whilst you can enjoy your plants.

All kinds of animals act as slug bouncers,

whether it's birds or hedgehogs, who can eat 40 in one sitting.

Toads and frogs see them as a tasty feast.

Ducks also love a slug.

And remember, not all the species are doing harm to our plants.

In fact, many of them are helping with the composting in our garden.

A healthy, sustainable garden has to have a balance of both

prey and predators.

And it is for that reason that I say that everybody is welcome

into my borders.

I've been doing this job in some form or other for nearly 35 years,

and over that time always one question has been much more common

than all the others, quite often all the others put together,

which is, how do I stop slugs and snails eating my hostas?

And I've long come to the conclusion that that's the wrong question and

I'm so glad that Arit and the RHS are pointing this out clearly now.

The right question is, how do I live and garden

with slugs and snails?

And we're not going to get rid of them,

so we might as well learn to live with them and perhaps, who knows,

even love them.

Now, I'm out here sowing biennials because the potting shed

has temporarily been occupied by a family of swallows.

They've been nesting in a tool shed and now the young have just fledged,

just yesterday afternoon, and they're going from nest

through the door outside, coming back in, crying to be fed.

The whole thing is a whirling mass of birds learning how to cope

with the big outside world.

So rather than add to their anxiety and get in their way, I'm shifting

out their way for a bit.

I'm sowing biennials.

Now, biennials are those plants

which drop their seed round about May, June, sometimes July,

they germinate quickly, develop into young plants, which then go

into winter with a decent root system and a foliage system,

but no flowers.

They either stop growing completely over winter or grow very slowly.

But as soon as spring comes, they're in a good position

to grow strongly.

They will then start flowering with the first flowering some time

in April and go on into June, and then set seed, which drops,

the parent plant dies, but the seed starts that cycle all over again.

And because they cover two years, that's two seasons,

they're biennial.

Now, I've got a few here which are amongst my favourites.

We've got Honesty, we've got Wallflower,

I've got Primrose Bedder, which is a lovely colour,

great for the cottage garden.

I've got a deep red Fire King which goes brilliantly with strong

tulips for the Jewel Garden.

I've got Sweet Rocket, the Hesperis.

I've got some white ones here for the Writing Garden

and I'll also be sowing Foxgloves,

which are probably my favourite biennial of all.

All of them need to be treated in the same way.

So just get normal peat-free potting compost,

and I've got some Honesty here which I'm going to sow.

And whatever you're sowing, always try and sow it thinly.

Press it very lightly down, so there's good contact

between the seed and the compost,

and then cover them, again very lightly.

Now, I will water that well and keep it moist, but it doesn't need

any extra heat.

You certainly don't need a greenhouse for this.

If you don't have the space or the set-up to grow anything

in seed trays or pots,

actually, biennials are really good if grown in a seed bed.

If you've just got a patch of ground the size of this tray,

you can make little rows, sow the seed in there

and then when the seedlings appear you can thin them, or grow them on

in the soil and then plant them into their final position

in September or October when you have nice, strong little plants.

OK, well, if you haven't got the message now,

I strongly advise you to go out and buy some biennial seed this weekend

and sow them, so that's a job for you.

And here are some more.

If you're planting out brassicas such as these cabbages for winter

harvest, they will need protecting over the coming summer months.

But pigeons and cabbage white butterflies find them irresistible

and netting is the best answer.

I use canes topped by small flowerpots, which make it easier

to stretch netting over the top.

Make sure it's taught so small birds can't get tangled and leave enough

room for the plants to grow.

This will keep pigeons away, but you will have to check

daily for caterpillars.

Whatever the weather, even if it's been wet, every

container should be watered weekly at this time of year.

They also need a regular feed

and I combine this operation by using a liquid seaweed

or tomato feed, which will encourage good flowering.

Give each container a good soak and that will keep them looking good

all summer long.

Tomatoes are now beginning to set fruit, and to speed up and aid

ripening, remove the lowest leaves so that the green fruit are fully

exposed to maximum sun.

And you can continue this process working up the plant

as the fruit develop.

And as well as helping ripening, it also aids ventilation,

ensuring that you have maximum health right through

the growing season.

Out you come. Go on. There you go.

Come on, then.

I love the grass borders at this time of year.

One thinks of grasses as being at their peak in autumn,

when you have all those tawny colours, golds and silvers,

and the flower heads are falling and you get that lovely sibilant

sound as the wind rifles through them.

But I love them most right now, at this point in the season,

when they're growing really strongly but are lush and green

and they're full of energy.

And whereas in the Jewel Garden

the challenge over the coming months is to harmonise and knit together

all these intense colours, in the grass borders,

green is the dominant colour and all the other colours,

like the Knautia macedonica, for example, float through them

and pop up and drift and disappear.

But the green is constant.

And it's not just the grasses that give it that energy.

You've got all these vertical lines from the fennel

and the thalictrums and the cardoons.

These are all growing tall and reaching with that rocket energy.

And yet at the same time, despite all that vigour, they manage

to be calm and even elegant.

But I'm afraid that's it for this

week and we're off air next week,

but I'll be here in a fortnight's

time at eight o'clock,

so I'll see you then. Bye-bye.