Episode 13 The Beechgrove Garden

DISTANT THUNDER

Hello and welcome to Beechgrove.

-The storm has just passed.

-It has!

By jingo, it was wet, wasn't it? Hence all these waterproofs.

That's it, we'll get some more later, I'm quite sure.

I think the ground needs it.

-We've been very lucky in this corner, you're quite right.

-Mmm.

Anyway, the story today that we're starting off with is peas.

-Yes, this is our...

-Lots of.

Umpteen different varieties.

Almost lots of because we've got gaps!

They're completely empty, nothing come up.

One or two come up here.

When I see that, I think maybe that's mice.

They find out where they are and they just go along the row

-and pick them out.

-They like one variety!

-That's it, isn't it?

-They're very juicy.

-I know.

Then Wando, Jim, that one,

we sort of took the soil away

-and we found that it had rotted some of those.

-OK.

Now that's a point I'll bring it in now

because we've had a listener, or a viewer rather, in Loch Linnhe

on the West Coast,

grown peas for years but they're yellow and dying off.

-Is that weather conditions as well, do you think?

-Could be.

It could be too wet, it could be too acid. We just don't know.

-We really need...

-More information.

Anyway, I think the outstanding feature of this year

are the way the stakes have been all arranged,

all different methods, starting at the top.

Are you going to get them to grow that high, George?

Well, they looked up, saw it and they've taken shock.

I think they'll make it up here. These are tall varieties.

-I like this one.

-That's off-the-shelf.

-It's rather nice.

-That's off-the-shelf, as well.

That system is quite good apart from the netting,

maybe polypropylene netting would be better

because it's rotted in the ground.

-Already?

-Yeah.

-This one we've used for years.

-That's a favourite.

Very easy with the chicken wire.

And the brushwood, very simple.

-On a budget these two, aren't they?

-Look at these two varieties.

-Yes!

-This is good news.

-Interestingly enough, in pots, warmer soil.

-No bother.

-Really doing well.

-This thing's called Half Pint.

Look at that, I would love a half pint that size.

-This one's Bingo, semi-leafless, not bad at all.

-That's good.

I once grew a leafless pea which was actually

bred for the combine harvester.

Guess the name?

Bikini. THEY CHUCKLE

Meanwhile, in the rest of the programme...

With a grand home like this,

I can also promise you

a grand garden.

And I did say I was going back to college.

This might just be the place where they grow gardeners.

Back in the small space garden

and this is where we're harvesting just leaves this year.

We've fed the ground intensively.

We've put lots of base dressing on this right at the beginning

when we were sowing the seeds at the start of the season.

It had potash, phosphate and nitrogen in it.

What happens is the nitrogen gets taken away from the soil quickly.

The crops absorb it to make big leaves and that's what we wanted.

When we cut the leaves off even the broad beans like that,

we've got stuff which is going to be succulent in our salad.

Now, even on a day like this, I think

a salad sometimes can be quite a nice refreshing sort of meal.

When we have taken off this crop of leaves, as it were,

you need to feed the plant.

It had its breakfast and it's growing really, really well

but now it's getting a bit late in the morning and it's getting

a wee bit hungry and needing a little bit of sustenance

like we would do.

What we do with this is we will feed it with some sulphate of ammonia.

There we are, we'll put that onto the crop there like that.

Now you sprinkle that over the surface of the soil, right?

Then, just very quickly, just tickle it in to the surface and,

of course, with all the rain that we've been having this morning,

that will soon disappear into the soil and be absorbed by the plant.

That's heavy in nitrogen. That will give us another good leaf crop.

We have harvested some radish from over here

and this is a variety called Flamboyant 3.

It's quite big at the moment but great colour

and that will add something extra to the salad.

That will be quite good.

Now that we've taken those out I'm going to sow

something else along the edge.

I'm going to sow some pak choi.

This is a brassica but it will do in the same space.

We'll be fine with that there.

These will go in all the way along the edge of the slab

and if you look at that lettuce down there,

what you'll find is those which are near the edge of the slab

are growing faster than the ones which are slightly further away.

That is the edge effect -

where we've got the extra heat from the slab,

makes the seeds germinate quicker and then the plants

get a quicker chance of growing and becoming something decent.

What we want here, of course, are lots and lots of succulent leaves.

We've added sulphate of ammonia now.

We've fed them, this rain is going to water them and we'll come

back later on and we'll see exactly how they've been doing.

As you probably know by now, I've got a bee in my bonnet

about where the craftsman of the future are going to come from.

There are plenty of degree courses for landscaper, designers and

garden designers and all the rest of it but who's going to do the work?

In my quest, the last time I was out I went to Breadalbane Academy

at Aberfeldy and I spoke to students there

who were actually on a course which is entitled Rural Skills,

in which they do get some horticulture but today I've come to

the wonderful grounds and buildings of Elmwood Campus here in Fife,

Cupar, Fife, which is part of the Scottish Rural College,

to speak to students here to see

if I can find an answer to how we're going to grow a gardener.

'I'm off now to meet Philip Watkin,

'manager of the horticulture programme.'

Now then, Phil, where do your students come from?

Predominately, Jim, they come from this area of Fife,

East of Scotland but we do get them...we've got

students from the Shetland Isles, we've got students from Spain.

We've had a student from Norway this year.

We get this eclectic mix from all over but mainly from the East of Scotland.

The facilities here are pretty nifty.

The main resource here are our grounds

because students can come here, they can do things

from seed sowing right the way through to

building ponds - you name it, they can do it.

What is the range? Where do you start? What do you offer?

We've got two basic routes that students can come.

They can either come here when they've been in employment

-and they can come block release.

-Yeah.

Or they can come here and do full-time courses.

They're ranging from, at one end of the spectrum,

from SVQ, that's Scottish Vocational Qualification,

practically based courses, going through to what we call the NC.

-NC being National Certificate?

-National Certificate.

Then moving on to the Higher National Certificate.

But what we're very passionate about with our courses

is that we don't want people to come in on this ladder system where they

can get halfway up the ladder and think they're a trained gardener.

What we're passionate about is that we've got these building blocks

that's going to build a gardener from the base.

They have to know how to prune trees,

sow seeds, the practical skills.

-I suppose I'd better go and talk to some of them.

-That'll be good.

Now then, Liam, you have obviously handled a spade before.

You're not a beginner.

Preparing, presumably, to plant this fella?

Yes, this is Acer palmatum Purpurea.

Why would you choose it?

It'll look really nice cascading into the water here.

-It's really nice for the area.

-Absolutely. Absolutely.

But from your accent, I know you're from Shetland.

-Yeah.

-What do you do there?

-I work in a local park for the local council.

-All right.

Just in the centre of Lerwick.

-You're obviously doing this kind of stuff all the time?

-Yeah.

-While holding on to your hat!

-Yeah.

How often have you been down here? What sort of course are you doing?

I'm doing a modern apprenticeship along with the council and SRUC.

Right. So how far have you gone? Are you starting, finishing?

I'm just in my fourth year and I've just finished the course.

-Oh-ho!

-So that's SVQ3.

-It's now reality from now on.

Are you going to try something else, are you going to move on?

I've been offered my job back at home so I'm going back home

and work away because it's a lovely place to work.

-So you enjoy working in a public park?

-Definitely.

What do you do with your spare time?

I write a blog actually for the council based on the Flower Park.

-Yeah?

-So, yeah, I also do a bimonthly article

for the local magazine.

-I suppose you play the fiddle, as well.

-Yeah, I do!

We need more guys like you, mate, in this industry. Great stuff.

-Now then, how are you doing?

-I'm good.

-Good stuff.

What's that you're putting in?

-Pyrethrum.

-This is a wee unofficial exam, by the way.

Aye.

-How did you get started in this caper?

-With my grandad.

-OK.

Did you sort of work along with him? Do you think it's in the genes?

Yeah.

What stage have you reached?

I'm going on to do my NC next year.

-What does that mean?

-Er, National Certificate.

-Oh, right.

What would you eventually like to do?

-I want to do therapy.

-OK.

Horticultural therapy.

Funnily enough, that's an area that is getting more

and more important as people realise what gardening can do for you.

That's fine for you.

I'm going to have a quick word with this fella here.

Now then, Callum.

That's pyrethrum. What's the purple in here?

That's prunella.

Any idea how high that's going to grow?

I think it goes up to about 60 centimetres.

Aye, that's good, that's good. You're doing well so far.

What goes in between in this blank space?

-We've got bedding geraniums to put in.

-Splendid.

It'll be quite a show. Absolutely.

-So...where do you work?

-I work at the University of St Andrews.

Oh, right. Are you enjoying that?

-Yeah, it's brilliant.

-What course are you on?

I'm doing a gardening apprenticeship.

Right, right, and so you come here quite regularly.

I come here for SVQ Level 2.

-Well, I wish you well.

-Thanks very much.

Good on you.

-Hi there, Moira.

-Hi, Jim.

Getting an essential job done?

-Yes, taking some of the dock weed out.

-Aye, quite.

Some of it, I notice, you say.

-Some of it.

-You can't remove all of it, can you?

-That's it.

It's an essential job and you've got the message, as well.

Yes, just putting it at the side just in case there's any

-wee beasties in there and they could go back in again.

-Yes, yes.

Now I've been speaking over the last couple of visits

to school pupils about careers in horticulture.

I've been speaking to young people here today

and you come under the category of midlife change of direction.

-Yeah, that's right.

-What did you do before? What did you do before?

Well, before I had my family, Jim,

I actually came to Elmwood in 1978

and I did a secretarial course.

I did office work for a while.

Yes, so that's a classic career, interrupted by family,

bringing up the family.

Now you have got a bit of time, what made you choose horticulture?

It's just that I love gardening but I really wanted to know a wee

-bit more about the botany side, a wee bit more in-depth.

-Yes.

So I came and done the National Certificate course,

which I just loved.

I did quite well so I carried on to do my Higher National Certificate.

-Oh!

-Which has been really enjoyable.

So are you going to capitalise on it?

I would love to get a job in horticulture,

especially maybe gardening therapy.

-You're the second person that's said that to me within minutes.

-Right.

It's brilliant.

I hope you enjoy the rest of your time on this course, Moira.

I'd better let you get back to that essential work you're doing.

-Thanks very much, Jim.

-Cheers, bye.

Well, you know, I'm in a better frame of mind now

than I was when I arrived.

Wonderful surroundings, great facilities,

very talkative students, going in the right direction,

so the opportunities are there to learn from the base upwards

and become really good practising horticulturalists.

I tell you,

I'm chuffed with what we've seen today.

The wonderful British weather, the clouds have opened again

but, never mind, we're going to carry on cropping here.

A bit like George with his small space gardening,

this is our decking area.

It's all about growing vegetables

and ornamental crops, as well, in containers.

So, you know, it could be a patio, maybe a balcony.

So what have we got here?

First of all I want to show you this lettuce

because I think that's a gorgeous colour.

It's an oak-leaved variety called Navarra.

If you want, you could just pick one or two leaves or

because that's quite mature now I've cut the whole lettuce.

Then lots of baby leaves here.

You know, George was cropping some of them.

We've got rocket because although lettuce is nice,

it doesn't necessarily have a lot of flavour to it, whereas rocket,

you know, can be really quite hot.

We've got mustard.

Again, that gives a nice little bite to the flavour of the salads.

And two different varieties of spinach.

I think it's this one that I would pick out.

This variety's called Reddy because it's got a lovely,

little red streak in the mid-rib there.

Then the radish.

George had a radish, didn't he? That one was called Flamboyant, I think.

This one is called Francis, a very similar shape.

It's a French Breakfast variety.

And also Mars.

That your typical red, round radish.

Well, I have had a wee taste

and of the two, Mars is a lot milder

and really crisp but if you like peppery flavours,

then go for this one, go for Francis.

Also, do you remember that I was sowing those seed tapes last week?

And the radish there, if you want to keep that succession going,

already the radish have germinated, just in seven days.

Finally, just before I get absolutely soaked,

I want to have a look at my tatties here.

The new pot, this is really interesting

because it is a pot within a pot,

so you can have a wee look and, yes, you can

see where maybe some of the tatties are going to start forming

but they've only been in this pot about seven weeks

so we're going to have to wait at least another five, six weeks

before we start cropping.

A wet day and where do I end up?

-GEORGE CHUCKLES

-In the bog garden.

We're trying to revamp this area.

We've just started the job and a bit of a guddle at the back of us,

and as you can see with all this rain, and I want to try

and do something with these sarracenias.

They've been in here since, what, 2011.

Now, I want to try and clean them

up a bit to make sure that we get rid of this weed here.

This is the weed that's been causing the problem - this is a rush

which comes up through, it's gone through everything,

it's got all these rhizomes -

it's coming up through all sorts of plants.

You know how when we lift things out of our herbaceous borders

when we've got things like bishop's weed in them, put them

in a nursery bed, well, I want to do the same with the sarracenias.

I want to put them into pots.

What I'm going to do here is put them into a pot of

a mix of 50-50 perlite and leaf mould.

It has to be something which is well drained because although these

plants are things which sit in bogs,

they do like to have moisture running past them.

They don't like to be sitting in stagnant water,

so usually you will find them in areas where the water drains

freely away from them, although they're still kept moist.

It's a bit of an anomaly, really.

But they like to have roots which are well elevated

and just kept moist.

So that's going into this pot here.

And we'll put that in,

put some compost round the back of it here,

get that in there.

I'll do that completely all the way round

and we'll sit that somewhere

so that we can watch and see

if any of this rush comes through and when it does,

we'll pull it out and eventually, we'll clean this up

and we'll get them back into the revamped bog garden.

What a day!

RAIN PATTERS

Well, it's time to check on the progress here in our tomato house.

These tomato plants were put in at the beginning of May

and they have really romped away.

They've really enjoyed the sort of weather we've been having.

Just to recap very quickly, the first two bags here are just plain

grow bags, sitting on the gravel.

My problem with that is over a period of time,

that compost gets flatter and flatter and flatter

and the drainage is very difficult and very lax.

So then we come to this idea of putting these

rings on top of the grow bag.

The rings are full of compost as well,

so it doubles the height of the drainage there.

Anyway, we'll carry on with the next system here,

which are these great grow bags.

Only three plants in them,

a bit expensive because it takes three or four grow bags

to fill each one and will they produce four times the crop?

I don't think so.

Over this side, we're into the automatics,

fed from a reservoir here and the little pipes there going in,

each one gets its own feed.

Then the system which was introduced last year,

we're trying to refine our technique with it.

It has a reservoir and the feed and the water

comes up from underneath, drawn up by capillary matting.

Back to this whole business about this height of drainage

and being sure that the water drains down and the roots don't get sodden.

One of the ideas that the old boys on the allotments do is turn

the grow bag on its side

and then you've got the full

height of the width - if you see what I mean! -

to drain. I saw this gadget here to do just that.

It's doing the business.

Absolutely fine.

But these are quite expensive.

They'll last a while, but they cost about 20 quid apiece,

whereas, as someone wrote in to tell us, you can just get a grow bag,

half it in the middle, stand it on its end

and you've got two plants there

and you've got this drainage problem solved.

So all these systems are meant to try

and improve upon the basic grow bag, to make it easier for you.

We'll report in due course.

Now then, to answer a question from Sharon Norton,

she wrote in to ask, do you remove side shoots?

And I'm saying yes, regularly.

This is what I mean.

We grow the plant as an upright cord

and a single stem and all these little side shoots,

if they're at that size,

just see how easily it snaps out.

If you let them get any taller or longer, they may leave a scar.

But look at how easy that comes out.

This is a difficult one,

because it's competing with the leading shoot.

Got to be a bit careful with this one.

This is a whole lot of wasted energy,

because we don't need this growth.

We want that energy to go into the fruit itself.

Time alone will tell.

I'm visiting Braco Castle Gardens in Perthshire, which has

a plethora of interesting plants and the majority of this is down to

head gardener Jodie Simpson, who's worked here for the last 30 years.

Jodie, when you came here in the '80s,

what was the major challenge you had to face?

Just the fact that it was 20 acres

-and a little unkempt in bits!

-Uh-huh.

And so... I was wondering how in fact to do it all.

Just getting to know the place, really,

cos I arrived in the spring

and was greeted by the snowdrops

coming up, which was pretty good, then lots of daffodils,

but beyond that, there was not much going on after the bulbs were over,

so there's a lot of new planting.

You're quite high up, as well?

We are, we are about 600 feet -

well, between 550 and 650,

which doesn't sound a lot, but it's a relatively cold garden

and the summer is short, the winter is very long!

The trees are leafless for about six or seven months, so to try and

extend the interest in the season is one of the major challenges.

I think that's really important,

-having a garden that lasts for 12 months of the year.

-Indeed.

Here we are at the pond,

which was dug out in the mid-'30s

and we have photographic evidence

of them digging that all by hand.

We have since dug it out again, around about 2000,

because it had silted up so much.

And it's a lovely tranquil setting.

I mean, at the moment, the iris are looking great.

Did you have to thin that clump down?

Certainly we had to lose quite a lot of iris,

because it was only a real puddle left at this end

and the rest had infilled with silt and grasses and stuff.

And the yew hedge, when do you clip that?

The big yew hedge there - in fact all the hedges -

are cut around about August, September.

I particularly like the way

you've got it fairly sort of informal, the shape of it.

That's more by luck than good management!

No, I think it looks really attractive, Jodie.

Well, because it's so wide - about eight feet across in some places -

when we get two or three feet of snow, it assumes different shapes

and doesn't always want to go back to where it came from!

It's nice and natural, and do you know what I spy at the end there?

It looks to me like some laburnum in flower. Can we go and have a look at that?

We can certainly go and have a look, it's a very nice feature here.

-You've timed it well.

-Perfect.

The laburnums, as you can see, are just peaking right now.

This is absolutely stunning, I've never seen anything like it!

-I've seen them trained over arches, pergolas...

-It's something else.

-It's so informal, to me, it's a glade of laburnums.

-Mm-hm.

And you know what? I think we should just stand and listen to the bees!

Yes, it's quite a buzz.

BIRDSONG AND BUZZING

-That's magical, isn't it?

-HE CHUCKLES

This is quite a recent development we have, the stone wall.

It's to make the most of the aspect here, which is

-really hot and sunny.

-It is very warm, so plants to go with that.

Plants to go with that,

sort of a chance to grow more Mediterranean type plants.

It's nice to have the thyme, cos you've got the perfume of that.

Lovely.

And the nepeta kind of doubles as a Scottish lavender, because

lavender here does not thrive at all

and we also have lithodora...

And that flowers for weeks, doesn't it?

-It does. It's been doing very well.

-What about the conifers behind?

The conifers were a replacement

for a monkey puzzle that was

hit by lightning.

A big monkey puzzle that used to be the centre of the garden.

And, when it went,

they planted these five cypress

probably around the old stump

and they give you a sort of focal

point in the middle of the garden, as you can see.

-It works really well.

-Mm.

This is a new area that we did last year, Carole.

Apparently, this is about as far away from the castle

as you can get and it has quite a tall circular wall.

So that's quite unusual, having a circular wall.

It is quite unusual, yes.

The area was a bit lost because of this large cypress that was

growing here, so we took it down and we've opened up this area

for another great spot for planting out things that like it hot and dry.

So it's nice that you've left a bit of the tree trunk for the rose.

Indeed, and it should scramble up over that, given time.

-These, presumably self-seeded? The verascums.

-Self-seeded, yes.

Don't need any staking, they're lovely filler plants.

You see the amelanchiers there, with the cylinders, is that

-because of deer?

-That's to keep the roe deer off, yes.

And do you have to do that with a lot of your shrub plants?

Pretty much, yes. If you look around, you'll see a lot of nets.

It's worth it, though,

-cos otherwise you wouldn't have a garden!

-That's correct!

-And what heat we've got today!

-Indeed!

-It's wonderful!

-It's absolutely arresting!

Jodie, this is another wow factor for flowers! The Montanas.

Well, you've been lucky again to catch the clematis at its best.

Absolutely tremendous.

Now, is that just two plants?

Er, yes, and they both start over there.

-So you certainly need some sizable wall!

-Yes!

And they go over the other side of the wall down to the bottom, too.

Having said that, you can prune them back, can't you?

-You CAN keep them under control if you want.

-You can.

You can pretty much do what you like,

-as long as you don't go down near the base.

-Absolutely superb.

But you know, anyone can grow the Tom Thumbs or the nasturtiums.

Absolutely - very easy to grow, good thing to start kids off on, even.

The poorer the soil, the better for the flower, but if you want

lots of foliage for eating or whatever, feed them a wee bit.

So you just lift up those grills?

Lift up the grills and pull out the weeds and sow the seed.

Jodie, this is an amazing place, I've had a fantastic day,

fantastic weather.

And with this heat, I think I could do with a swim in the pond!

-Thank you very much.

-My pleasure.

It's time to harvest the comfrey.

Some people would say, "But it's still in flower

"and the bees will be looking to the flowers," as they are as we speak.

I'm not going to cut it all at once

and there's plenty flowers for the bees at the moment.

What I'm interested in is getting these stems,

getting them chopped up and into the bin here.

Put a weight on the top of them and out of that spigot

there at the bottom comes this beautiful liquid with which

we were feeding our tomatoes last year and it did a fine job.

You know, June is the perfect month

if you've got any cloud pruning to do.

I suppose I'd tend to call this pine a lollipop pine

and what you need to do is these new candles,

the best idea is to cut those back by about half.

Of course, if it's gone out of shape,

you can prune it a bit more, but basically, candles back by half.

Four years ago, I sowed the seed of Meconopsis napaulensis -

look at that.

There it is now, it's flowering.

It sat in a seed tray for one year, in a pot for another year

and it's been planted out here for two years, now it has flowered.

What's going to happen now?

It's going to produce seed and then it's going to die.

So now we've got to save this seed and sow it

and start the cycle again,

but you have to have patience with gardening.

Well, I tell you they say, "There's nowt so queer as folk."

Here are we, sat sitting in the Alpine Garden, getting soaked!

With our feet in the river!

-But the slate looks nice now it's wet, actually!

-It does!

The deluge has done it good, taken the dust off. It's splendid.

I think it's amazing how those plants have started to

settle in now. Just in a few weeks,

they've started to spread, haven't they?

All coming over the rocks here, just looks as though they've always

-wanted to be here. He's done a fabulous job on it.

-Yes, Brian has.

But if you'd like any more information about this week's

programme, it's all in the fact sheet

and the easiest way to access that is online.

Now, the next time, Jim and myself won't actually be in the garden,

we're going to be at the Children's Hospital in Aberdeen,

helping them with a really therapeutic garden.

And that's in three weeks' time,

because some people have got their priorities wrong,

they're away at tennis and cricket

and other flower shows and things.

We'll see you on the 23rd of July.

-Bye-bye!

-Bye!

-Bye-bye!