We're well into August and Monty is pleased to see that his hostas haven't even been nibbled. He believes that is down to him trying to grow healthy plants and give them the conditions that they will thrive in. This also has a lot to do with the balance of wildlife at Longmeadow, where there are slugs and snails but also lots of thrushes, blackbirds, hedgehogs and toads, frogs and beetles, all of which eat the slugs and snails which eat the hostas. Monty explains that you have prey and you have predators and you have a whole ecology that looks after itself. Nothing gets out of control. Everything is on a state of subtle balance, and if it is a balanced garden, then it'll be a beautiful healthy garden as well. Naturalist Simon King shows us the wildlife that depends on our gardens, we visit a small space designed as a haven for garden creatures. Carol Klein is first at Pilsdon Pen, which is one of the highest points in Dorset. It used to be the site of an Iron Age Fort but that has all gone now and all that remains is close cropped grassland full of wildflowers, and in amongst them is a tiny little flower - bird's foot trefoil, so-called because of the seedheads which are three pods arranged just like a bird's foot, and those pods tell you that they belong to the pea family. Probably the most celebrated member of the family is the sweet pea. Carol visits Forde Abbey in Dorset, where the walled garden is filled with sweet peas. She meets Alice Kennard who has masterminded the display there.
Monty is already thinking about next year which means now is the time for him to start collecting seed. He collects seed from astrantia and silene and stores them in brown paper bags. He bought the silene from the Malvern Show in May which started the planting off and now he can keep it going by ...
Monty goes into the potting shed at Longmeadow carrying purple sweet peas which are a similar colour to the penstemons. One of the special things about penstemons at this time of year is they give you a huge range of colour. He shows how to take cuttings by looking for new material but leaving en...
Monty is in the White Garden, also known as the Writing Garden where he wants to plant autumn bulbs. He has a bag of corms of colchicums which flower September time. Monty advises to wash your hands after handling colchicums. Colchicums require a lot of sun so it is important where they are plant...