This week, as its delicate catkins unfurl on bare branches, Digital Science Editor Olivia Drake introduces this month’s RHS Wildlife Wonder plant — the hazel – which not only supplies queen bumblebees with much needed early pollen, but also provides tasty nuts and abundant leaves to support a huge range of wildlife throughout the year. And while it may still be a little early to sow most crops directly outdoors, if you’ve got a greenhouse or warm windowsill you can get a head start on the growing season. Down at RHS Garden Wisley, Liz Mooney is busy sowing aubergines, sweet peppers and chillies, and she’ll be sharing her top tips for getting the best from these heat-loving crops. Finally, Professor Ross Cameron from the University of Sheffield – author of Plants Can Save Your Life – joins us to explore the science of plants and wellbeing, and how indoor gardening can play a powerful role in boosting our health.

Host: Guy Barter

Contributors: Olivia Drake, Liz Mooney, Ross Cameron, Gareth Richards

Links:

RHS Plants Can Save Your Life: How to live healthier and happier with plants

Wildlife wonder - hazel

RHS Grow Your Own

Now is a great time to start planning what to grow, and this week, we’re diving headfirst into the seed catalogues for inspiration! We’re exploring some of the tastiest, and most eye catching, additions to the veg patch: heirlooms! We also take a deep dive into tomato cultivars, as Liz Mooney shares her top picks from last years 'tomato extravaganza’ which saw her grow more than 50 varieties at RHS Wisley's world food garden. And finally, let's get back to basics with the foundation of any abundant veg plot: the soil! Nick Turrell and Jenny Laville dig into the ins and outs of how to care for earth beneath your feet.

Host: Gareth Richards

Contributors: Lucy Hutchings and Kate Cotterill from She Grows Veg, Liz Mooney, Jenny Laville and Nick Turrell

Links:

Mangelwurzel

Tomato Black Beauty

1,500 Year Old Cave Bean

Chicory Rose of Venice

Beetroot Red Toad

How to grow tomatoes

This week we’re telling the story of peat: from the value of this amazing otherworldly habitat, to the threats facing these rare landscapes and work being done to protect them, and how growers and horticulturists are adapting to a peat-free future. We’ll be speaking to Beth Thomas from the Yorkshire Wildlife Trusts, RHS Peat-Free Research Technician Scott Spriggs, and plantsperson Mairi Longdon from Tissington Nursery.

HOST:  Jenny Laville

CONTRIBUTORS: Beth Thomas, Scott Spriggs, Mairi Longdon

LINKS:

Yorkshire Peat Partnership

RHS Soil analysis service

RHS Gardening Advice service

RHS peat hub

RHS peat petition

Tissington nursery

This week we’re rolling up our sleeves to look at how we can support our garden visitors, while also preparing for the burst of life that spring will bring. The RSPB’s Emma Marsh is back to share how monitoring projects like the Big Garden Bird Watch can make a real difference when it comes to helping our declining species. Gareth Richards pops in with his top tips for growing one of his allotment favourites (and a firm favourite with bumblebees too) the humble raspberry. And Olivia Drake shines a spotlight on the RHS Wildlife Wonders plant for January: the shrubby honeysuckle.

Host: Nick Turrell

Contributors: Emma Marsh, Gareth Richards, Olivia Drake

Links:

Sign up to the Big Garden Bird Watch

RSPB free guide and ID chart

How to grow raspberries

Why you need a shrubby honeysuckle in your garden

Today, we’re joined by the RSPB’s Emma Marsh, who shares how she has made her garden into a haven for birds. We’ll also conclude Nick Turrell’s countdown of the most influential plants that have shaped human culture, and history around the globe. Plus, now is the best time to get outside and prune your freestanding apples and pears. The RHS’s Jim Arbury gives us a masterclass on exactly what you need to do to keep your trees productive and in shape for the year ahead.

Host: Guy Barter

Contributors: Emma Marsh, Nick Turrell, Jim Arbury

Links:

Plants for birds

Apples and pears: winter pruning

The new year has arrived with an Arctic blast, and so it feels like the perfect moment to retreat indoors and let the garden live in our imaginations for a while. Nick Turrell joins us to continue his countdown of the most influential plants that have shaped human history. Guy Barter shares his practical ideas for making the most of your Christmas tree in the garden, and Pru Murray takes us through some of the new partner gardens RHS members can enjoy visiting in 2026.

Host: Gareth Richards

Contributors: Nick Turrell, Guy Barter, Pru Murray

Links:

Nick Turrell's most influential plants part 1, and part 2

Visit rhs.org.uk/partnergardens to search for Partner Gardens to visit local to you and find out their opening times for members. 

If you want to suggest a garden to join the scheme or have any other feedback you can email the team on: [email protected]

As 2025 comes to a close, host Nick Turrell looks back on a year of discovery in this special end-of-year edition of Gardening with the RHS. From the quiet resilience of winter-flowering hellebores with plantsman John Grimshaw, to the gentle industry of hoverflies with RHS entomologist Josie Stuart, and a summer journey into Britain’s rare temperate rainforests with designer Zoe Claymore, this reflective episode revisits three listener favourites that reveal how even the smallest patches of nature can support a much wider living network.

Oh the weather outside is frightful but there’s still plenty of wonder to be found out there. James Armitage, editor of The Plant Review, joins Gareth Richards to reflect on the quiet beauty of the resilient plants that carry us through the winter months, and on the quiet beauty of seeing familiar plants anew.
We begin with writer and plantsman Phil Clayton, who tells the extraordinary story of the Wollemi pine, tracing its journey from near-extinction to gardens around the world.

James then sits down with Tom Christian to discuss the remarkable diversity of the ivy family, a group of plants rich in variety and resilience, whose beauty and horticultural value are often underestimated.

Finally, we meet South Korean artist Seong Weon Ahn, whose delicate paintings capture plants not only with botanical precision, but with a deep sense of presence and mood.

Contributors: Phil Clayton, Tom Christian, Seong Weon Ahn

Links:

Subscribe to The Plant Review

Host: Gareth Richards and James Armitage

This week, we honour the stillness of winter and the returning promise of light as we mark the winter solstice. At this turning of the year, we reflect on the people, plants and initiatives that this new light brings into focus.

We begin by stepping into the richly curious world of Christopher Lloyd, the influential gardener and visionary behind Great Dixter House and Gardens. His legacy is recalled by his former student and now Head Gardener at Great Dixter, Fergus Garrett.

Nick Turrell then returns with his top 10 countdown of plants that changed human history. This time, Nick delves into one species that helped ignite a vast global industry, asking whether its influence has ultimately made our lives better or worse.

Finally, a look to the future with Sara Redstone who shines a light on a pioneering initiative taken up by theRHS, focused on strengthening plant biosecurity, highlighting the vital work being done to protect our plants and ecosystems for generations to come.

Host: Gareth Richards

Contributors: Fergus Garrett, Nick Turrell, Sara Redstone

Links: 

Great Dixter 

Protect your garden health 

Biosecurity at the RHS 

Defra list of authorised distance plant sellers 

This week, RHS Head of Libraries Fiona Davison, garden designer Zoe Claymore and RHS Gardening Advisor Nick Turrell gather to share their must-read gardening books of 2025. Along the way, they explore what really makes a garden waterwise, dive into the astonishing world of fungi, demystify regenerative gardening, and get to the root of soil science. They also journey through the makings of a temperate rainforest, spotlight remarkable horticultural heroes from history — and yes, they even tackle the topic every gardener loves to hate: slugs.

Host: Fiona Davison with Nick Turrell and Zoe Claymore

Books mentioned:

Garden People: The Photographs of Valerie Finnis - Ursula Buchan 

Botanical Illustration: The Gold Medal Winners - Charlotte Brooks

RHS Waterwise Garden - Tom Massey

RHS Fungi for Gardeners - Dr Jassy Drakulic

RHS Slugs: Friend or Foe - Dr Hayley Jones

The Kindest Garden: A Practical Guide to Regenerative Gardening - Marian Boswell 

Illustrated History of Landscape Design - Elizabeth Boults 

One Garden Against the World - Kate Bradbury 

The Lost Rainforests of Great Britain - Guy Shrubsole