HortWeek Podcast

Harrowden Turf's managing director Stuart Ridd-Jones talks on the Horticulture Week Podcast about the company's diversification from turf growing to wildflower turf, sedum, green roofs and topsoil.

Ridd-Jones gives us a market outlook and discusses new technology such as the Firefly Harvester.

The effects of extreme weather due climate change on smaller gardens means we need new types of turf, such as shade-tolerant products, he says.

Plastic in wildflower turf and not mowing turf as part of campaigns such as 'No Mow May' are hot topic and he gives us his views.

And finally, Harrowden Turf has a partnership with rural mental health charity You Are Not Alone (YANA) and the importance of that is also brought up.

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Horticulturist Chris Collins, the Westminster Abbey head gardener, talks to the Horticulture Week podcast about the royal wedding and how he would have prepared the gardens for the big event.

As a former Brighton Parks gardener, Collins rues the decline in funding for green spaces.

And as Garden Organic head of horticulture, he talks about his role promoting organic gardening.

The ex -Blue Peter gardener also discusses his campaigning during the annual National Children's Gardening Week, as well as his myriad roles in community and professional gardening in the UK and overseas.

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Alistair Yeomans has been with Plant Healthy since it was set up 2019. Plant Healthy is the biosecurity standard for UK businesses, mainly growers.

The Plant Health Alliance is made up of Defra and about 20 trade and other membership bodies including the National Trust, RHS and HTA and they own the Plant Health Management Standard and the Governing Body of the Plant Healthy Certification Scheme.

Yeomans talks about how the scheme will expand, how it can never cover the whole industry but still has a crucial role to play in biosecurity:

"At the end of the day we're dealing with a wicked problem...we can only really improve the situation rather than really solve it, and the more people that get on board, the risk is minimised."

He outlines scheme's importance to the industry and Defra and how the certification works.

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Melanie Asker was recently promoted to managing director of Greenwood Plants, supplier to new-build property sector, but increasingly, commercial work and infrastructure.

Listed at no 27 in HortWeek's Top 100 Ornamentals Nurseries ranking, the nursery grows "pretty much everything you can think of" but, a 'G' range comprising the "top 350 plants across most of our orders".

2022 was a record-breaking year for the grower, a year when it changed from an owner-led firm and introduced a management team, developed a new business strategy, a 5-year growth plan and brought sustainability "to the fore of all our corporate values and all we wanted to achieve".

While nurseries and garden retailers continue to wrestle with the prospect of going peat-free, Greenwood Plants made an early decision to get ahead of the curve and has plans to be 100% peat free by the end of 2023:

"It's progressing really well. It's got its challenges, I'm going to be totally candid about that. It was a really big decision for the business - we debated it really heavily at the start of last year... We decided we needed to be completely committed to it for it to work so we had to jump in with both feet which is what we've done."

"It sounds like the change is all about the growing media... but the bigger change is about how we cultivate and grow our plants, that's where the real, resetting of the mindset comes in and that's what we're going through at the moment." With ericaceous and other plants that struggle with peat-free compost, "we just have to tackle them one by one", she says.

She also reflects on the move to peat-free in the context of the general horticulture sector, clients, the supply chain and the wider marketplace. 

• Watch HortWeekTV's Peat debate which explores all sides of the argument here 

Greenwood was named "Sustainable Business of 2022" by the Central South Business Awards, largely down to Greenwood's comprehensive and ambitious sustainability plan which incorporates water efficiency, recycling, peat-free, community 'payback', energy efficiency and renewables, plastic reduction and sustainable packaging.

The nursery has also placed a greater focus on biodiversity benefits lately and in a fast-changing world, the nursery endeavours to "keep abreast of everything from a topical and trend perspective" maintains "as open lines of communication as possible" with clients to help them do that.

Melanie outlines other business initiatives including "Greenwood Choice" sales and collection outlet and speaks about her enthusiastic involvement as a founding member of Women in Horticulture which aims to provide networking opportunities for women in the industry and share ideas.

And finally, she has to make her choice, from a very wide selection, of her Desert Island Plant.

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Eliot Barden headed a field of 15 to win AIPH young international grower of the year at IPM Essen in January.

But at the start of his career, which began at the age of 15 with an RHS evening class, some teachers were not encouraging about his prospects (a not uncommon experience for many in the sector} and one which informed his current role as production and education manager for mature tree supplier Majestic Trees.

"Not everybody is cut out for an office job. I think people that show interest [in the outside world and the environment] need to be encouraged into it and I think that's through careers advisors, teachers developing people, maybe even including horticulture on the curriculum."

He discusses ideas for promoting horticulture careers including more Government support for apprenticeships and more support for sector training and recruitment:

Eliot is frank about the impact of the forthcoming peat ban for which horticulture has suffered a lack of support and "joined up thinking":

"At Majestic we've done regular [peat-free growing] trials for the past 10 years now...and we still don't have answers", adding, "we're certainly going to have to reduce the number of plant species we can grow". There are also particular challenges affecting tree-growing and transport that he outlines.

• Watch HortWeekTV's Peat debate which explores all sides of the argument here 

Majestic Trees has had its own, widely-publicised issues with biosecurity and Defra's handling of it, and Eliot gives his take on the situation:

"There's no two ways about it, the nursery trade does spread the diseases, but at the same time we've got to be really pragmatic about the threat, the diseases that are being transmitted, and how they're dealt with".

Not all nurseries are equal in how they source, inspect and treat diseases and and "some form of accreditation" should be given "to the good guys" and irresponsible nurseries "stopped somehow", he argues. Plant Healthy is "a step in the right direction" but "could do with some reevaluation".

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Peat-free and peat-reduced growing media may lack beneficial microbes to promote break down of plant residues, improve soil carbon and pH; and help to provide plants with available nutrients throughout the season. 

ICL's technical controls manager Sam Rivers explains that the microbial inoculant Vitalnova Triboost consists of a population of beneficial microbes. It contains enzymes and three live cultures of Bacillus subtilis, Enterococcus faecium and Lactobacillus plantarum – all freeze-dried.

TriBoost treated plants saw better rooting and were ready for sale 2-3 weeks earlier.

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Trees for Cities is a charity that helps facilitate tree planting in urban contexts but as recently-appointed chief executive , Kate Sheldon explains, the benefits are wide-ranging and sometimes surprising:

"Some of the biggest risks in cities [are] around heat and flooding and I believe that as an urban tree planting charity we can have more impact in planting for those risks and for the social value of what we do, rather than the carbon". 

She explains how the charity helps local communities, schools and parks plant trees in their area and the care taken to ensure the right tree is planted in the right place as well as considering the maintenance and longevity of the trees.

"We tend to plant where there is less than 20% tree canopy cover...but we also look for places where people might be facing barriers to engaging with nature."

She talks about their campaign "Trees Breathe New Life" - launched on the 'Forgotten Places' project which targeted places with few trees and which face socio-economic difficulties and where trees are seen as a "nice to have". It provides training for people to "open people's eyes to the opportunities" in the green sector, help with people's mental health and also help address issues such as climate change and how "trees can be part of the solution". In this way, Kate says Trees for Cities can be part of addressing the skills shortage by inspiring young people into the industry through their tree planting experiences.

On the controversial topic of street tree felling (famously in Sheffield and more recently, Plymouth) Kate says: "I am appalled...there are very few design schemes that can't be worked around existing trees...I don't think you can use that as an excuse for felling so many mature trees."

She talks about Government tree planting targets and challenges sourcing suitable, and healthy trees.

And she touches on trees' contribution to efforts to improve biodiversity and talks about plans for the future: "the real area we can have the most impact is around engaging communities" and a new community engagement strategy will be her focus, recruiting new leaders at the charity and security funding, ideally through new major donors, patrons and ambassadors.

Having planted more than 1.5 million trees, the charity says there are many more opportunities for planting more, though the familiar barriers of planning, avoiding street services and money still persist.

"[Local authorities] don't always have the capacity to be managing the trees they've currently got, let alone planting new trees, so sometimes that can lead to some cultural or capacity barriers to planting....but where there's a will, there's a way!".

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Director of the Landscaping Consultants, BALI South Thames chair and board director Jake Catling is a landscaper who brings genuine drive and enthusiasm to his work.

In this episode Jake talks about the excitement and challenges of working on two RHS Chelsea Flower Show gardens and provides fascinating insight into the process of putting together a Chelsea garden from the contractor's perspective.

"The most interesting part of it for me is 'the build', the nuts and bolts, how things are going to together, how things are done and the logistics."

A Chelsea 'veteran' of five years, Jake has also racked up eight years at Hampton Court which he describes as "our proving ground...it feels like a summer camp for us!"

Chelsea gardens now all have an 'afterlife' where they are rebuilt so Jake talks about where this year's gardens are going, how they will adapt the garden to the new site and the value to the community that will benefit from it.

Jake discusses his role on the BALI board and his "mission" to help bring the BALI Academy project to "fruition" to help address the oft-commented skills shortage, although he admits it is "no easy task".

Jake's determination and passion extend to his interest in innovation in equipment, working processes including digital design, and performance coaching for staff. But he says he owes a lot to BALI for support in the early days, the boost of winning a BALI principle award and his ongoing role there.

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This episode Glendale's director of corporate development Adrian Wickham and Tessa Johnstone of Johnstone's Landscapes return to the Horticulture Week Podcast to give us an update on their important work on improving diversity in horticulture industry.

Both members of the BALI board, they joined various industry associations to sign Equality Diversity and Inclustion (EDI) charter last year and they talk about the work and aspirations around the charter including the ever-present skills shortage.

They have expanded their work to reach out to all areas of horticulture and collaboration is a key way they hope to make progress which includes sharing work and good practice in EDI, setting benchmarking and helping organisations upskill in this area.

Adrian has created an industry standard questionnaire to gain an industry "baseline" to, as Tessa says, "not just be a tickbox exercise but something that guides us through and does actually achieve change in the industry".

They discuss progress achieved since we last spoke to them (in 2021 - listen here) which includes, and starts with, a greater awareness in the horticulture industry. 

Adrian outlines improvements in Glendale including mental health training carried out in collaboration with horticulture charity Perennial. The company has also joined the Design Lab - a London-based initiative, to examine and encourage best practice.

A key area of improvement is how to improve recruitment practice - application forms, wording on job ads, approaches to interviews - to more effectively give opportunities to people to more diverse backgrounds. Adrian speaks about initiatives working with prison populations. And Tessa outlines ways to close the gender pay gap and measures she's taken in her own business to improve EDI - including signing up to the 'Disabilty Confident' scheme and taking on a new employee with autism.

In summary, businesses should be less afraid of 'doing it wrong' and look into small ways they can improve. "Everybody has unconscious bias" says Adrian, adding "don't be afraid of your thoughts".

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Primrose Hall Peonies' Alec White is an RHS Chelsea Flower Show gold medal award-winning British specialist peony grower and holds the Plant Heritage National Collection for unusual Intersectional or Itoh peony varieties.

He has also written a new book A Love Affair With Peonies, which involved five years of nationwide travel to photograph peonies in bloom.

White talks about meeting the Queen at Chelsea, how online business has held up since lockdown ended, what shows he is doing in 2023 and the support small nurseries need to succeed.

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