HortWeek Podcast

HortWeek columnist and business consultant Neville Stein talks about his 50-year career in the industry. He discusses his path into horticulture and the "life-changing" impact of some of the articles written for for HortWeek over the years. Neville's regular features for HortWeek include: Whatever Happened To... - a series exploring the history of much-loved nurseries that are no longer in busines...

BBC Gardeners' Question Time stalwart and landscape architect Bunny Guinness returns to the HortWeek Podcast to give her views on some of the pressing horticulture issues of the day. Topics covered include garden sector shows. Bunny wonders if there are too many that are struggling commercially. She expresses particular concern over RHS Chelsea Flower Show gardens and the lack of commercial sponso...

Welcome to the second of HortWeek new stream of podcasts where we give the HortWeek take on the biggest news stories editor Matthew Appleby, technical editor Sally Drury and senior reporter Rachael Forsyth give their digested and analytical views. Issues this week: The thorny question of whether dogs should be allowed into gardens, an issue that dominated the recent RHS AGM the pressures affecting...

Good Gardeners International is a charity that since 1962 pioneered the no dig system in the UK, based on Sir Albert Howard's research on organic farming. Richard Higgins became involved in 1995 after a formative trip to India and inspired by Howard, developed the HH-2 (Howard-Higgins Agricultural and Horticultural System) Waste Management and Horticultural System. The HH-2 equipment reproduces sp...

This week's guest is Guy Watts of West Sussex-based specialist plant nursery, Architectural Plants. After a successful debut at RHS Chelsea Flower Show, Guy talks about Architectural Plants' apprenticeship scheme Home Grown which he hopes will encourage new talent into the industry. The nursery grows and sells a huge variety of unusual and exotic plants, and in line with the nursery's aims to redu...

HortWeek is launching a new stream of podcasts where we give the HortWeek take on the biggest news stories. Drawing on the immense industry expertise of editor Matthew Appleby, technical editor Sally Drury and senior reporter Rachael Forsyth the podcast will give listeners a digested and analytical view with added perspective and insight. Stories tackled this week: the admission by the RHS that it...

Six months into her role as head of parks and gardens at the National Trust Sheila Das speaks to HortWeek’s Rachael Forsyth about the Trust’s new strategy and how it is taking a step back to re-evaluate its approach to planting, the “scarcity and abundance” of water, climate change, outreach, education, going peat-free and more. Speaking on changes at Cliveden in Buckinghamshire – where The Long G...

Andy Jasper CEO and Peter Jones director of horticulture, both fresh faces at Eden Project, speak to HortWeek’s Rachael Forsyth about their goals and ambitions for not only the Cornwall attraction but for the multitude of “new Edens” that are opening across the UK and internationally.  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This week's guest on the HortWeek Podcast is Rebecca Bevan, who leads on sustainability and plant health for National Trust Gardens.  Rebecca comes fresh from publishing her new book, the National Trust Book of Nature Friendly Gardening, which "looks at gardening in a way that's good for people and good for the planet" and is full of ideas and tips for amateur gardeners. "I was given fair amo...

The Chartered Institute of Horticulture recently published the results of its survey into rates of melanoma among horticulturists and the alarming but perhaps not unsurprising results showed one in eight of the 700 respondents said they had been diagnosed with some form of skin cancer.  HortWeek wanted to lend it's voice to its campaign and invited the CIH's Jason Daff, Susanna Daniels f...

Valeria Kogan is founder and CEO of Fermata – a data science company developing computer vision solutions for both controlled environment agriculture and outdoor.  With a background in biotech, Valeria saw an opportunity in the market to bring the knowledge from the medical space to agriculture. Meeting with friends of friends who were tomato producers, Valeria learnt about the problems they...

Horticulture is a home to endless study, innovation and learning and on this episode of the Cultivate Your Future podcast Neville Stein is shining a light on where horticulture meets cutting edge science, because his guest is plant scientist, Dr Madalena Vaz Monteiro. Madalena works for part of the Forestry Commission's research division, and as you’ll hear, a lot of her work revolves around the r...

BBC Gardener's World Live runs from 12 - 15 June this year so the HortWeek Podcast took the opportunity to talk to Immediate Live horticultural director Bob Sweet and event director, Lucy Tremlett about shows past and present. After record attendances for the BBC Gardeners' World Live May Spring Fair show held at Beaulieu, Tremlett is looking forward to some 90,000 visitors over the four days.&nbs...

This week's HortWeek Podcast guest, TV presenter and garden designer Mark Lane, started gardening young although he initially studied art history and worked in publishing for RIBA and Thames & Hudson. After a car crash in 2000, a horticultural therapist and his husband suggested a new horticulture career as a designer and in the media.  His new book, The Future of Gardens, published...

In this HortWeek Podcast , Andrew Wilson, technical manager for ICL professional horticulture and Carl Mason, experienced grower and ICL technical area sales manager for the East of England, speak about how to grow the best professional quality poinsettias. While Christmas may seem a long way off, in June UK growers will be starting to produce Poinsettias to adorn our homes in December. The poinse...

Lee Connelly, the Skinny Jean Gardener and the UK's leading children's gardening educator talks about National Children’s Gardening Week, which is from 24 May to 1 June. As part of his ambassadorial role, he will lead the 2025 UK School Gardening Tour, sponsored by National Garden Gift Card. He will visit selected schools across the country, bringing hands-on gardening experiences to 10,000 childr...

Joining Matthew Appleby on the latest HortWeek Podcast is Pippa Greenwood, the well-known horticulturist and broadcaster, who is HTA horticulture manager, where she supports the membership as well as the broader garden and greenspaces industry. BBC Gardeners' World  television programme and has been a regular panellist on  Gardeners' Question Time  on  BBC Radio 4  si...

Joining Rachael Forsyth the week's HortWeek Podcast are Harry Baldwin head gardener at the Somerset garden and estate, The Newt, alongside Katie Lewis, estate architect. After four years as a headline sponsor at the Chelsea Flower Show , it is The Newt's 'finale' year and it is set to showcase tropical plants sourced from nurseries in the UK, South Africa, and from its own collection in its Karoo...

Director of operations at The Batsford Foundation Stuart Priest has led a rich life in horticulture, starting with an apprenticeship with Blakedown Nurseries followed by a National Diploma in Hardy Nursery Stock at Pershore College. He joined Batsford Arboretum in 1986 after an opportunity came up to open a nursery at the Cotswolds attraction. After developing a successful hardy fern production li...

Neville Stein's guest on this episode of the podcast works in one of horticulture’s most hands-on areas, arboriculture. James Gadd is a director of Gadd Brothers Trees and Landscape and as an arboricultural professional he works with amenity trees – those found in private gardens, public parks and open spaces, schools, churchyards, playgrounds, urban woodlands and nature reserves and alongside roa...

Joining Rachael Forsyth on this week's HortWeek Podcast is John Durnell from the Hampshire Wildlife Trust and Alistair Emery, founder of Land and property investment and consultancy, Kingwell. John and Alistair are collaborators on significant natural capital scheme at Keyhaven near Milford-on-Sea converting degraded arable farming land into a "high value wildlife site". Kingwell bought the farm i...

HortWeek is delighted to present the Cultivate Your Future podcast, in partnership with the Colegrave Seabrook Foundation and sponsor Westland Horticulture. At a time when horticulture needs to encourage a new wave of young people to come into the industry, this podcast is designed to highlight the multiple and varied career opportunities available. Hear from people who have found their way into t...

This week's guests are Chris Wellbelove (recently appointed managing director) and Steve Buckingham, CEO of Blakedown Landscapes. Blakedown just won the contract for the Queen Elizabeth garden scheme for The Royal Parks as part of their landscape construction framework. Chris outlines work being done using "environmentally sensitive construction methods" and Steve discusses some of the highlights...

ICL  Professional Horticulture Technical Manager Andrew Wilson explains what water soluble fertilisers are and how they can be applied directly to the plant through drip irrigation and foliar application.  He explains how to apply them through a diluter, overhead irrigation or drip irrigation. WSF’s are usually applied as a supplementary feed in combination with a Controlled Release...

Roisin Wilson is business development director at HSK Gardening and Leisure, which is a specialist importer of 'Jurassic' plants from the Antipodes, specifically Dicksonia antarctica tree ferns from Australia. It is a tightly regulated activity, but Roisin explains that the tree ferns it imports from Tasmania are 'rescue' tree ferns that might be otherwise cast aside by loggers. Big plans are...