Letter D The A to Z of TV Gardening

Hello and welcome to The A To Z Of TV Gardening,

where we sift through all your favourite garden programmes

and dig up a bumper crop of tips and advice

from the best experts in the business.

Flowers, trees, fruit and veg,

letter by letter, they're all coming up a treat

on The A To Z Of TV Gardening.

Everything we're looking at today begins with the letter D.

'Here's what's coming up. Alan Titchmarsh gets poetic over delphiniums.'

In spite of all my meekness, if I have a little weakness,

it's a passion for a flight of delphiniums.

'Dead-heading - the battle for success in the Gardener Of The Year competition.'

You're not meant to miss any, either. You can't just go for the easy ones, can you?

'And Monty Don on when best to plant dahlias.'

And that actually is the perfect time to pot on or plant out a plant,

so that you can see the roots around the outside but it's not root-bound.

That's all in store on today's show.

But first, a flower that represents the start of spring

and hopefully signals the arrival of nicer weather.

'Our first D is for daffodils. It's planting time

'and here is Monty Don with some tricks on how best to do it.'

We don't often show you this part of Berryfields,

but we use it all the time. All our storage stuff is down there.

We've got turf stacks and building materials

and also nursery beds and all our bits and pieces,

and we've got this curling path going through the grass which we let grow long.

And I thought we'd plant some late-flowering daffodils in the grass

which would follow the line of the path and could look really beautiful.

And I've chosen a variety called Actaea.

This is an old-fashioned, tried and tested variety

that's been grown since the First World War

and it's got beautiful white highly-scented flowers

that grow to about 18 inches tall

and they're rimmed with a little ring of crimson round the edge.

A really good daffodil that will last for a long, long time.

I was going to say forever, but probably for as long as you and I will.

So it's worth taking trouble planting them.

If you can get them in by the middle of October, you'll maximise their growing period.

And I've got 600 to put in here, so it's quite a big job.

And I had thought of using this turf-lifter,

which you can hire, this costs about £25 a day or about 80 quid a week,

and it makes a good job of lifting the turf. You just drive it through

and you can see it just makes a flap that you fold up.

The other thing is that with daffodils, you do need to plant them about four inches deep.

So once you've lifted the turf,

you'd still have to dig down.

And after a hard, hot summer like this,

the ground is pretty fierce, even without the turf.

My feeling is, if it's going to make a difference then hire it,

otherwise probably not worth it for daffodils.

However, if you're putting a lot of crocus or muscari

or other small bulbs in, it's ideal.

And all you do is just get a handful like that,

put them on the ground, fold the turf over,

job done, they're planted. And you can do thousands like that.

But they do make a straight line. So to get them looking natural,

you need to take slabs of turf out around the place.

And in the end, I'd rather just go straight through it.

By the way, if you're buying a bulb-planter,

get a long-handled one and get a good one.

They're worth every penny you pay for them, nice and strong

and it will last you for years and years.

But if it's cheap, it'll break just after the first few hundred.

And then take out a plug.

And the way that I like to plant lots of bulbs

is first of all, don't rush it, take it nice and easy,

and do all the holes, or a good batch, anyway, first.

And you can see that, as you dig the second hole,

that pushes out the plug for the first.

And I'm not measuring, I'm not worrying about how deep it is,

but ideally, it wants to be about four inches down.

And we're not putting them in a grid.

Traditionally, you throw the bulbs on the ground and plant them where they land,

but the trouble is, you have to move the bulbs to plant them.

But it's never really as easy as that.

I just go for it and let my instincts guide me.

Now, I'd keep doing that until I got bored of it,

probably do about 50 or 100, and then go onto the next phase,

which is, unless you've got very light soil,

to put a handful of grit in each hole.

It adds to the job, but remember, these daffodils are going to last

for years and years and years

and it's worth giving them a good start.

And they hate poor drainage.

So on this heavy Berryfields clay,

the grit just helps them establish

a little bit better.

That goes on there and then we get the bulbs.

And actually, also worthwhile having another container

and I'll show you why.

Because you've got the depth of the bulb...

And that's the sort of size you're looking for, a nice, healthy bulb.

By the way, feel them. If they feel at all soft, don't plant it.

And if you're buying them by the hundred, you're bound to have a few that are a bit dodgy.

Pop them in the holes.

Now, because of the grit and the bulb, this is too big.

So just put the excess in there and put the plug back on.

Now, this is a slow job. It's real gardening.

It's not something you do for show.

But you will reap the rewards next May

and every May for generations to come.

Now, I think it's much better to plant just one variety

if you're doing naturalised planting.

But if you don't know what variety that might be,

you need to go and see a number of them.

We went along to Cheshire to see Len Tomlinson

who's been daffodil mad since he was a small boy.

Daffodils, I've always been interested in daffodils.

Always. It's the first sign of the spring and it lasts so long.

Everything to do with daffodils and the season,

I think that's what it's all about.

A lot of these daffodils have been planted here for well over 50 years.

I can remember working with my eldest brother with the horse,

drawing the drills out and planting daffodils here.

You walk through the daffodils, you can hear the bees.

Life is on the way.

Some of the varieties I've got are ageless, really.

They've come from the wild, so they could be, you know, since Adam was a lad.

Obviously, the late ones have all got a perfume,

because when they come out, the insects are about,

so they've got beautiful perfume.

There are daffodils for every month,

from February right through to late May,

starting with the trumpet daffodils that we all know

and the wild forms of trumpet daffodils,

running right through the narcissi coming later

and the doubles usually are late season,

right through to the poeticus, the wild varieties, late on in the season,

May, even into June, some varieties.

So there's daffodils for every season

and they're all beautiful.

This is Polar Ice.

It's about early 1900s.

This would flower middle of April, the whites,

through to the middle of May.

The ones that you can see behind me are Flower Record.

This is a very vigorous variety,

very disease-resistant and it was a great commercial variety.

It's now become quite rare,

but you wouldn't think so by the look of it here.

But it is actually quite rare.

Most daffodils are good for naturalising.

Some will grow and produce lots and lots of flowers without being split.

Others you would have to dig up occasionally and spread them out,

otherwise they make loads of bulblets and no flower.

The white one there, that's Actaea, that's a particularly good variety.

Very good commercial variety. Always crops heavily.

Beautiful perfume and a very good commercial variety.

A lot of modern hybrids have been bred commercially

and they're grown to excess,

they're grown so that they're ugly.

They haven't got the natural beauty.

'We've learnt how to plant daffodils

'and all the varieties available out there.

'We now head to Wales with James Wong

'to find out why farmers there are growing daffodils in the millions.'

'There is more to this Welsh icon than meets the eye,

'or in this case, the mind.

'The daffodil produces many chemicals,

'one of which is galantamine.

'The drug, originally found in wild snowdrops,

'combats Alzheimer's, the most common cause of dementia.

'But it's expensive and difficult to make.

'The Stevens family farmed predominantly sheep until 2004

'when they decided to try growing daffs as an alternative source of the drug.'

My son decided he wanted to be a farmer when he grew up.

And Hill Farm is not a really commercial, viable alternative going forward,

so I was looking for diversification opportunities for a Welsh hill farm.

We're off the beaten track, there's no passing trade, a farm shop wouldn't work.

We needed a crop that had an industrial application.

And presumably the conditions up here mean the things you can grow are quite limited.

Full of stones, high altitude, so it's cold.

-Not the easiest place to plough and cultivate.

-You're absolutely right.

Some of the daffodil-growing experts I've spoken to

consider me to be completely mad.

But I'm not growing daffodils, I'm growing galantamine.

What's the market like for the product?

Currently, the market is worth about 8 billion.

The problem with Alzheimer's disease is it's increasing at a terrific rate

and that's set to double in the next 20 years and double again in the following 20 years.

Anything that can tackle those numbers has to be a good thing.

'Neighbouring farmer John Price is one of a new breed of daffodil growers.'

-You don't dig them all up like that, do you, John?

-No, not quite.

This is just a random sample that's required to be taken on a weekly basis

to sort of try and identify when the galantamine is at its highest level within the plant.

Are they particularly hard to grow in this environment?

The elements are a challenge, and growing them at 1,200 feet,

which is the preferable height, creates problems,

but no, the daffodil's a very resilient plant, basically,

and it's able to establish itself and grow well in most circumstances.

-So how much do you need for a sample?

-That quantity is fine.

-OK, just like a bunch of supermarket flowers?

-Exactly.

So you've got one. How many more do you need to pick?

We've got another four varieties. Clearly they're all different.

-It's easy to identify them by their different heads and their different flowering stages.

-OK.

-So I'm going to invite you to take the samples.

-OK. Free labour. Brilliant.

'Galantamine is only found in a few varieties of daffodil

'and only in significant quantities when it's grown at altitude.

'This stresses the plant and causes it to produce the chemical.'

The smell of some of these varieties is really intoxicating.

The thing is that I wouldn't be tempted

to start knocking up a home remedy out of these

because they are extremely toxic.

'Armed with my daffodils, I'm off to a trial site

'high in the Brecon Beacons to meet Professor Trevor Walker.

'His research has gone a long way

'in treating some of the 460,000 people

'affected by Alzheimer's in the UK.'

It looks like you've got a picnic set up here, Trevor.

What are we going to do?

-We're going to see if there's any galantamine in these varieties that you've picked for us.

-OK.

We'll cut these bulbs off.

We'll squish some juice out of them

and take that juice back for filtration.

So you're already looking for the presence of galantamine in different plants. What sparked off that hunt?

We had a eureka moment when the wife of one of my colleagues

was diagnosed with Alzheimer's disease at the age of 58

and we decided we'd do something about it.

We'd make galantamine available as an anti-Alzheimer's drug

to do something about the extortionate costs

and the tremendous cost of care.

If you can delay someone going into a home for a few years, then you've made a great saving.

-You've got a lovely collection there.

-Look at that!

That's absolutely perfect. We'll take that back to the girls at the labs.

-And that's enough?

-That's enough.

-You'd never think that that bit of plant juice

would contain such an important drug that can really transform people's lives.

So your purified extract goes in there.

And what are all these spikes on the screen?

Each of these spikes represents a different alkaloid.

This one happens to be galantamine.

Alkaloids are biologically active chemicals often found in plants.

Yes, they are. But they have to be managed properly.

-You can't just drink daffodil juice.

-Mm-hm.

The daffodil is an alkaloid factory

and there are an awful lot in this because it's a very complex species.

Who would have thought? A revolutionary drug from something in your window box.

Well, it has to be made in very large quantities.

A few grams, like we're getting here,

isn't going to make many tablets.

But when we have enough thousands of hectares

and enough tons of the material,

then significant numbers of the world population could be treated.

'Now, for the first time, the daffodil fields are able to commercially supply galantamine.

'Currently, people like Keith Warward get the drug elsewhere.

'He was diagnosed two years ago.'

Totally gutted in the beginning.

You think it's the end of the world.

But time passes and you realise that life will carry on.

I'm living a full life...

..thanks to the medication that I'm taking.

So how do you take the galantamine? Is it a pill or an injection?

-No, it's a pill. It's only about that big.

-OK.

Right, so a single pill a day and it has this huge impact on your life?

Oh, it's unbelievable! Unbelievable.

The work that these guys are doing here, growing all of these daffodils,

you think they just look pretty, but it's so important to so many people.

-It is. Especially me!

-THEY LAUGH

You might think you'd need to trek into the Amazon

or to the heart of Siberia to find botanical cures for major diseases,

but who would've thought the humble daff would be such a giant

at treating a debilitating disease that affects so many people?

Isn't that amazing? Still to come, dahlias, delphiniums

and the dreaded dandelion.

But now let's look at the biggest flower family in the world.

'Because D is for the daisy family,

'also known as asteraceae.

'And here's a botanical lesson with Carol Klein.'

Ahh. This is beautiful!

Every so often, I get the opportunity

to actually sit in my garden and enjoy it.

I mean, what else are gardens for, when it comes to it?

But perhaps this isn't the place I would've chosen during the month of August.

There was nothing really exciting going on.

But now just look at it.

This gorgeous Rubeckia.

It's Rubeckia fulgida deamii.

Daisies are such beautiful flowers, such a gorgeous construction.

They almost look like the kind of flower that a child would draw,

with this centre and then these beautiful petals around the edge.

The petals actually are called ray florets

and the whole purpose of them is to draw insects from far and wide

to come and feast in the centre and pollinate the flowers.

And the flowers are right in the middle,

but there is not just one, there's a whole collection of them.

There's lots and lots of little ones.

And the daisies themselves make these gorgeous flat platforms

so that insects can land and feast to their hearts' content.

Rubeckia fulgida deamii needs decent soil.

It needs a good living.

So if you're really on the dry side, don't try and grow it.

But there are a host of other Rubeckias, too, which you could try.

One of them is the annual, Rubeckia hirta,

and I've got a load of one called Rustic Dwarves,

which was one of my mum's favourite flowers,

and they are so rewarding! They just give you colour and colour and colour.

They're wonderful cut flowers, too.

All the Rubeckias and many of the other daisies that we use in the late Autumn garden

are from the prairies of North America.

But this scintillating blue aster

is Aster frikartii Monch

and it doesn't come from the States at all.

It's a cross between a European and an Asiatic species.

It flowers almost endlessly from July onwards

and, as you can see, it's a pretty good companion to these Rubeckia.

I no longer grow aster novi-belgii,

the most popular Michaelmas daisy,

cos I got fed up of people wandering down the paths and saying,

"What's that plant with the interesting white foliage?"

It was actually powdery mildew and it completely disfigured the plants.

The reason for powdery mildew is that these plants are very, very inbred

and the further a plant gets from its species

then the more likely it is to get disease.

And powdery mildew is caused usually in very dry conditions.

So I'm afraid I abandoned them.

Well, I'm not afraid, actually, because the asters that I've adopted in their stead

are so much worthy of a place in the garden.

They've got clouds of flowers.

Plants like aster Little Carlow, which is one of my favourites,

and aster Coombe Fishacre

with these sort of cumulous cloudy, glorious myriads of tiny flowers,

giving you a very, very soft effect.

And later on, just starting now, is aster novae-angliae.

That's a tall, handsome sort of plant.

It tends to have bare legs, though,

and most of the flower is concentrated at the top.

But I think growing some Rubeckia round its bare legs

is a really good solution.

The two will enjoy the same conditions

and they complement each other perfectly.

'One member of the daisy family is the flower we're examining next.

'They can be grown in most soils,

'on the ground or in pots,

'and there are shapes and colours for every taste.

'Our next D is for dahlias.

'And here are two dahlia devotees from Cornwall

'who a few years ago helped drag this once unfashionable flower

'back onto the big stage.'

# I said no, no, no

# Yes, I've been black but when I come back

# You'll know, know, know #

Dahlias were seen very much as the bald old man on the allotment

growing the exhibition flowers for the local flower show

in the one glass vase and carrying it down there preciously

and putting it on the bench, and they did have an image of that.

# Just try to make me go to rehab

# I won't go, go, go #

But, of course, they've now changed with the advent of their use in garden schemes

and many of the landscape gardeners.

I think of Great Dixter and the wonderful work Christopher Lloyd did down there.

They've enjoyed a tremendous popular renaissance

and they've become a real wow and must-have in many of our modern gardens.

One of the things that we're beginning to see now

is a resurgence of interest in some of those original species varieties

that came from Mexico 350 years ago.

They were first discovered by the Spanish Conquistadors.

They found two things. They found dahlias and they found potatoes,

and both headed home, actually, to Spain.

When dahlias first came over, they were looked at primarily for a food crop

and for their medicinal aphrodisiac qualities.

It didn't stand out initially as a garden plant.

It was just a very simple flower like this.

And it certainly didn't have a major wow in terms of its initial impact throughout Europe.

Once we get to the 18th century,

we saw other European countries getting interested.

And if you look at the modern forms of varieties,

collarettes have got a very French influence

and the pompom varieties actually are very German-influenced.

And it was quite late on, actually, in the scheme of things

that the things moved eventually into Holland

and ultimately here into the UK.

For me, in all my years of growing dahlias,

there's nothing been better than this.

This is a dahlia that I saw in Auckland in New Zealand

three years ago, this is Magenta Star.

For my money, the dahlia with everything.

The colour, the iridescence of the foliage

and the continual flowers

make this probably the top dahlia of last and this century.

At Chelsea last year, we took a small number of dahlias as part of a bigger exhibit

and I think we were quite surprised at the reaction that we got

from the public when they saw them there.

And I think a lot of us questioned, "Couldn't we see more dahlias at Chelsea?"

And we talked about it and said, "Let's have a go."

What we looked at was how we could best achieve it

and we thought, "Right, the dahlia normally flowers in September,

"so we're going to give it June, July, August cultural conditions."

So those are the conditions we've given them, plenty of water, plenty of warmth and plenty of feed,

as if we were growing them normally, but we've done it from the period

January, February, March, April, May.

It's really very, very early in the year for dahlias.

We're talking about the middle of May,

and in most people's gardens, middle of August, maybe.

We've needed heat, we've needed light

and we haven't had much good light this spring,

so yes, lots of sleepless nights.

I'm feeling quite guilty having talked Mike into actually bringing an exhibit of dahlias to Chelsea.

It's been a struggle. I don't know now even if we're going to make it.

I hope we will. It's looking good today. But we never turn down a challenge.

The public asked us to bring these flowers to Chelsea,

and my goodness, we're going to have a good go at it.

John, you set yourself a challenge, didn't you, this year?

First time ever at Chelsea and you have won the President's Award

and put on the most amazing display. How have you done it?

Well, we grew them as if they were growing in natural season,

so we started them in January and we created conditions

that you'd have June, July, August.

And I've lost a bit of hair and the growers have lost a lot of sleep,

but we've got here, and what a fantastic result for the dahlia.

So it's all about cheating the season, isn't it?

But why do you think that they've come back into fashion

and everybody wants them these days?

Well, all plants have fashions, but what we've tried to do

is go for very simple dahlias

which reflect the ones that came over from Mexico.

The singles have transformed the dahlia

and some of the colours that you see,

Magenta Star and some of the other ones on this stand,

have actually made them incredibly popular.

'Now we're joining Monty Don again,

'this time to learn the best way to pot young dahlia plants.'

Originally, my plan was to grow these on

so they'd be nice, stocky plants for next year.

But I think that we can get flowers out of them this year

and we can do that in pots.

Dahlias are tropical plants.

They like warm, wet conditions.

So I'm going to give them some extra goodness at the bottom of the pot.

I've got two barrows here. This is pure garden compost.

And then I've got my potting mix here, homemade.

Right, that goes like that.

Now, this Arabian Night, which has got a really good red flower.

And you can see, look, good root system on that.

And that actually is the perfect time

to pot on or plant out a plant,

so that you can see the roots round the outside but it's not root-bound.

Now, I'm putting these round the outside

cos it just gives it more room

and the plant will then consolidate to create one mass,

whereas if I cram them in the middle,

they would immediately be butting up against each other.

And I guess we'll start to have flowers in a few weeks' time.

As well as Arabian Night, I've also got another good red, Grenadier,

and David Howard, which is a fabulous apricoty-orange colour

with dark brown leaves.

'And we'll leave Monty with his planting and move onto a competition.

'The Gardener Of The Year, in fact.

'Four green-fingered contenders taking on a challenge

'that comes with a double-D factor.

'Dahlias and dead-heading.

'Joe Swift and Carol Klein will be keeping an eye on what's going on. Take it away.'

Finalists, you have three minutes to dead-head the dahlias

-starting now!

-HE BLOWS WHISTLE

They've really got to get in there.

You're not meant to miss any, either. You can't just go for the easy ones, can you?

You've got to go thoroughly through them.

Look, Candida's definitely got the hang of it, hasn't she, there?

Is she taking them back to the right point?

You've got to take them back to where they're going to branch out and make another flower.

Morris has missed loads of them.

He's already gone to the end

-He can't leave... He's going to come back, isn't he?

-I don't know.

-Bob.

-Bob's getting focused. He's so focused, Bob, isn't he?

-Yeah.

-He's doing well.

-He's got a great big bunch of them.

-And he's doing it all in one go, look.

-You have one minute to go!

-How's Chung doing?

-Chung's too timid.

-Too slow.

-Get in there.

-Get in there!

He's really working. Look at him go!

-Yeah.

-Look at that. He's done it beautifully.

-Yeah.

-HE BLOWS WHISTLE

-Please stop what you're doing!

Come on, Bob, let's see what you've got first.

Interesting. How do you think that went, then?

My dad used to grow them. I used to pull them off when I was a kid for him.

-But I've never cut them before in my life.

-OK.

Cos you were very methodical, the way you went through.

-Bob was like a machine.

-Yeah. SHE LAUGHS

He just went through the dahlia, didn't hold back whatsoever.

-Very impressive, yes.

-Really, just one fell swoop.

-Yeah.

-Really well done. And look how many.

-Chung, how do you think you've done?

-Oh, I hope I'm doing it all right.

I do this at home every day,

but I'm not sure if it's up to standard.

She took the stem right down to a node,

the appearance of the plant when she'd finished was top draw.

But not all that many, really, are there?

-Candida, how have you done?

-Well, it was OK.

Not a huge amount, but I hope I've done them tidily.

She did well. Erm, she wasn't too confident to begin with,

but she quickly picked it up.

Morris, you went disappearing off into the horizon.

We couldn't see you. You went steaming along!

I had to because there were not enough to cut off in the first batch.

-I mean, Morris really took off, didn't he?

-Well, Morris was great.

He approached the task with great confidence and efficiency

and he did actually just speed through it, so he was very good.

-So, all in all...

-Very, very good.

We've got a draw again. Bob and Morris, top points there.

And after them,

and there is really hardly anything in it, Chung.

And Candida, you scored the least points.

But it's big decision time. We've got to lose one of you.

We've totted up the scores for all your five tasks today

and I'm afraid the person we have to say goodbye to... is Chung.

OK. That's all right. Thank you very much.

-Well done.

-Well done. ALL CLAP

'Poor Chung. And in case you were wondering,

'Bob, who you saw there, went on to win the entire competition.'

Taking care of a garden isn't easy.

There's always something that needs doing, even if it's just getting rid of those hated weeds.

Which takes us onto our next subject,

a flower most gardeners consider an absolute nuisance.

'This D is for dandelions.'

'Popping up here, there and everywhere,

'for many, the dreaded dandelion is a pest,

'destroying neat and tidy gardens.'

But not everyone perceives them as an evil garden weed.

In fact, there are many who are quick to heap praise on these yellow flowers.

And I'm off in search of the dandelion fan

to find out what gets them so excited about this yellow weed.

'And where better to begin than with someone who chooses to grow them?

'Paul Richards grows herbs to make into products for the alternative therapy market.'

So here we are in the middle of one of your fields

and you're actively encouraging dandelions to grow.

-They're a weed, aren't they?

-Well, they are a weed,

but you can see that we've got St John's wort here

and oregano growing over here,

and in between, we just let the dandelions grow.

It's a sort of peaceful coexistence, if you like, I suppose.

And this time of year, just so they don't get out of hand, we dig them up.

And it's a very useful medicinal herb. We use the roots of it,

-which we make into a tincture.

-And what's a tincture?

A tincture is a liquid product in alcohol

which you take a few drops in water or fruit juice.

So a lot of people will try and specifically get rid of these from the garden

cos they have a tendency to take over.

Do they take a lot of maintenance to keep them down, as such?

Well, we tend to leave in between the rows

because by digging them every year at this time of year,

we find it just keeps them in check,

but also enables us to enjoy the flowers, which are really beautiful.

'Interestingly enough, the French common name for the flower

'is pissenlit, meaning wet the bed,

'and in fact, it really does act as a diuretic.

'The name dandelion comes from Old French,

'dent-de-lion, tooth of the lion,

'because it was thought that the leaves of the flower looked just like lion's teeth.

'Love it or hate it, there's no denying the dandelion's a tenacious plant.

'Dominic Price gave me the lowdown on the secret of its success.'

So, Dominic, is there more than one type of dandelion?

Yes, there's possibly up to 250 types.

Nobody can quite agree on the exact number.

-But they must all look quite similar.

-They do.

There's small differences in the leaf structure,

some of them are very jaggedy, some are quite round,

some are very large, some are very small.

Some of them are extremely rare, as well.

And why are they so prolific? Look at them stretching out behind us.

They take over whole fields, whole gardens.

Yes, well, one plant can produce more than 2,000 seeds in a year,

and if you imagine each of those seeds forming a plant in a single growing season,

they have an ability to take over extremely quickly.

As a child, I remember picking them up and you tell the time by blowing them and seeing how they blow away,

-so that's basically spreading the flowers.

-Oh, yeah, an incredible aerial dispersal system.

The sort of thing engineers dream of, lifting that weight and carrying it for hundreds of miles.

So if someone does have them in the garden

and they really dislike them and want to get rid of them, what's the best way?

The best thing to do is catch them early if possible.

They form these huge taproots, so if you can get them while they're still small,

they will come up easily and they can be dug up.

It's best to do it when the soil is fairly damp and just try and do it in one go.

If you break them, you will probably end up with two dandelions where you had one before.

'And if you can't beat them, I guess you might as well eat them.

'I met up with Debs Cook from the Herb Society

'for a gourmet dandelion master class in soup.'

We've got some stock and you'll need a little bit of seasoning,

and the dandelion leaves, that'll be the last stage.

Everything was sounding very tasty until you mentioned the dandelion leaves in the end.

-They'll be fine. Trust me.

-OK. I'll trust you.

-And then just pop that back on and stir it up a bit?

-Yep.

There we go. And leave that for a little bit.

Over here we've got a little salad that you've prepared already. So...

It actually looks like you've got some of the dandelion flower in there, the yellow.

Yeah, we have, because you can eat the petals.

-This looks like a...

-Kids' favourite, dandelion and burdock. Lovely stuff.

Is that what you put in here? I don't actually remember it, but...

Mm! That's really nice. And what else have we got over here?

-We've got some dandelion coffee.

-Dandelion coffee?

-Yep.

-So this is the powder here?

-Yeah.

It actually looks like coffee. That's just extraordinary.

And it smells just like it. Granulated coffee, isn't that amazing?

-So what part of the dandelion is this?

-That's the root.

So when you see dandelions growing in a garden or in a meadow,

-you see beauty, not a weed?

-Yes, I definitely do.

'Dandelion soup is packed with vitamin B, C and E.

'20 minutes of simmering and we're ready for the taste test,'

Now, I have to say, I've tried a few things over the years.

I've had stinging nettles, which weren't so nice.

But this is the first time I've ever had dandelion soup.

-So you think I'm going to like it?

-I think so, yeah.

-OK.

Right. OK.

Mm!

-That is surprisingly tasty.

-See? Told you so.

I don't think I'll look at dandelions in quite the same way again.

-Good.

-This is very nice. Yum.

Mm.

So, there you have it,

the virtues of the really rather useful common dandelion.

All that's left for me is to collect a few for my tea.

'Who would've guessed they could turn out to be so tasty?

'Now, from a weed to a flower that can be tricky to grow

'but is still loved by most gardeners.

'It's also a favourite with slugs and snails.

'Our last D is for delphiniums.

'And we start our look at them

'with garden expert and poet, Alan Titchmarsh.'

In spite of all my meekness, if I have a little weakness,

it's a passion for a flight of delphiniums.

How can you look at these and not be impressed?

But they're not always easy to grow.

Anybody who's tried will say, "Oh, they're a martyr to slugs and snails."

And indeed they are, but get the recipe for growing them right

and you too can enjoy spires like these up to six or seven feet high.

Among my favourites, Blue Nile,

as near to Royal Blue as you can possibly get.

And to the right of it, Blue Jade,

the colour of a May or June sky.

To grow them well? Well, as you can see, at this kind of height and vigour, they are greedy feeders.

They need a rich soil, plenty of garden compost or manure worked in,

and a good feed of blood, bone and fish every spring,

but also good drainage.

I grow mine in quite sandy soil.

I've built a brick-raised bed, filled it with sandy loam, which they love,

because that slight dryness in the soil gives them the good drainage

and makes it slightly less encouraging to slugs and snails.

Though I protect my delphiniums in the first few weeks of growth

with those copper collars that you can put round the shoots.

They'll last for four or five years before you need to increase them,

and you can do that by shoot cuttings in spring.

Just scrape away the soil as those shoots are coming through,

put your knife in and root them in sandy soil.

And then you'll get a lovely show like this.

Now, Blackmore and Langdon have been exhibiting here since the very first Chelsea in 1913.

And from what you can see here,

they show absolutely no sign of fading.

'Inspired? We hope so.

'But if you can't make up your mind on which you love the most, have a look at this garden in Kent.

'The local delphinium society there care for over 200 varieties.

'You'll be spoiled for choice.'

Delphiniums give you a huge range of colours.

We get cranberry colours, pinks, whites, very nice creams,

purples, light blues, Cambridge blues,

but no reds, I'm afraid, and there are not likely to be in the future.

Here is a very nice mid-blue called Molly Buchanan, with a dark bee.

This has got the right shape, it's not big and awkward,

it's very attractive and is a lovely garden delphinium.

I'd rate it highly on that. Many people disagree, I assure you.

There are a multitude of opinions about what is the best, what's the nicest colour, et cetera.

Most people go for the deep blue,

and I think I'm a culprit of that, as well.

But this particular plant here, this real zingy blue of a colour,

it's quite frilly compared to some of them,

with just a little hint of white there.

But it is quite a zingy blue, I think you'd agree.

This one here,

Tiddles,

erm, is so pretty.

And I like it because of the compactness of the flowers.

As you can see, the flower's got three layers,

and the one in the middle, which is called the bee,

you can't see it very much because that's actually the same colour as the flower,

which I think is quite attractive.

I love this one.

# Loving you

We look after the Royal Garden of Godinton House,

and we've been doing this for about ten years now.

And the Royal Garden is developing all the time.

So every year the display actually gets better,

and this is probably one of the best years we've ever had.

People say, "They're too big for me."

But there are ways you can make delphiniums smaller.

When the shoots come out of the ground, there are masses of shoots,

many delphinium growers thin them out to make them grow tall.

But if you do not thin them, they will grow much shorter and you'll have many more flowers.

The other thing is, the more you water them, the taller they will grow.

The most frequently asked question is, "I can't grow delphiniums because I've got slugs."

And they do eat some of them,

but a slug is a person you've got to live with and you've got to fight him.

The taller varieties are obviously affected by the weather.

They just fall over and there's no way of standing them back up again.

They just snap and everything's lost, really.

I mean, we all get frustrations over them and things like that,

but you go back for more.

Some years you think, "Why am I bothering with this?"

But you go again and again

because you've just got this thing about delphiniums.

I'm very saddened to see that they are so under-represented in gardens around the country.

Clearly a delphinium likes the best soil and the best mulch you can get,

keep away from the trees, get lots of good sunshine, water them well.

Do what you can for them and they will reward you very richly.

The slug you just have to fight constantly.

And you have to choose your own way that you wish to do this.

I won't tell you what I do, it's not very nice.

Well, that's slugs and snails. But we've got no time for puppy-dogs' tails,

because we've come to the end of the show.

Do join us next time for some more top tips

on our A To Z of TV Gardening. Until then, goodbye.

Subtitles by Red Bee Media Ltd

.