This week's plant story began when Sam Turner mentioned gooseberries to me and a collection of bushes that might still be hiding in the undergrowth of a long-abandoned botanical research station in the shadow of Britain's largest radio telescope at Jodrell Bank.

One of the things I love most about making Our Plant Stories is the way that stories are now coming from listeners, which we can tell together.

Listen to hear how Sam and I venture into that undergrowth, where there are many very large stinging nettles, to see if we can find those gooseberry bushes. If we find them, we can also tell the story of Frank Carter and a prize gooseberry growing tradition in Cheshire, that goes back over 200 years.

Sign up to the podcast newsletter here so you can get every episode of Our Plant Stories in your inbox on the day I publish. A half hour plant fix!

In this podcast I strive to bring you not just the plant but the place, hoping that gets you closer to the joy of these stories. You can support this ambition through Buy Me A Coffee and a donation of any size is appreciated.

Can I share my plant story with you?

YES PLEASE! I called this OUR Plant Stories for a reason and that is that I love to hear from listeners wherever you are in the world!

You can email me [email protected] and tell me your plant story. That's all you need to do - I'll do the rest. I'll work out who we can talk to. Can we find someone who shares your passion for the plant, they maybe in the same country as you or the other side of the world.

This podcast uses the following third-party services for analysis:

OP3 - https://op3.dev/privacy

In 2017 Paul Oldroyd bought a Japanese banana plant. He got it home in the passenger seat of his car. He didn't have a lot of money to spend on plants but he had a very large space to fill.

He had taken on a one acre former commercial greenhouse that was six foot deep in thistles.

Find out in this episode why that first banana plant has been so important to creating a community space - Oldroyd's Corner - in Beverly East Yorkshire.

Maybe you'll want to grow a banana plant by the end of this episode - Paul in conversation with Florence Mansbridge, from the Eden Project will tell you how.

Paul's partner, Jo Lax, who listens to Our Plant Stories told me about this garden and I love it when the stories come from listeners. If you have a plant story you would like to share - just get in touch.

Our Plant Stories is presented and produced by Sally Flatman

The music is Fade to Black by Howard Levy

This podcast uses the following third-party services for analysis:

OP3 - https://op3.dev/privacy

Try saying "compost" to gardeners and see what happens. Inspired by a recent episode - Compost Tales - that's what I did for this short 'Just Say Compost' bonus listen.

I hope these stories of waste and worms will inspire you to share with us, your compost story.

Old hands or newbies, head gardeners or renters, bins or heaps, we'd love to see your photos and hear your tales.

How to take part:

Post a photo of your compost to Instagram and TAG @compost_tales

Or send a photo to [email protected]

Can I dig into more plant stories?

YES! You can check out the website where there are lots of photographs of plants and how to grow instructions. Our Plant Stories website

You can also follow the weekly blog where you will get the behind the scenes lowdown on making the podcast and you could also contribute - readers have suggested gardens to visit, plants to feature, experts to contact.

Our Plant Stories blog

And you can follow more plants over on my Instagram account Instagram

This podcast uses the following third-party services for analysis:

OP3 - https://op3.dev/privacy

The RHS Chelsea Flower Show, opens its doors to the public today - this is one of the gardening world's great horticultural moments - drawing around 157,000 visitors to the 23 acre grounds of the Royal Hospital. First held in 1913, Chelsea has spent over a century inspiring gardeners and growers to showcase the very best in horticulture, all competing for the coveted Chelsea Gold Medal.

This year, watch out for the Missing Collector Garden, built by the charity Plant Heritage, sponsored by Project Giving Back - this is their first ever Chelsea garden. Over the past 6 months, I have been exploring how this garden has come to life.

Designed by Sally-Anne Rees, Kate Campbell and William Murray, from the Planting Design Collective, the garden conjures a mysterious gardener who has just stepped away from his precious plant collection. It aims to shine a light on how many beloved garden plants remain unprotected by national collections.

After 18 months of planning, it's finally being revealed to public and judges alike.

Other episodes I have made about this garden which you might enjoy.

The Idea The Plant Grower. The Chair Farmer

Our Plant Stories is presented and produced by Sally Flatman

The music is Fade to Black by Howard Levy

This podcast uses the following third-party services for analysis:

OP3 - https://op3.dev/privacy

In this episode we are focused on compost and listen out because there will be a chance for you to get involved and tell us about your compost journey.

Liz Elton is an artist whose work looks at waste and the recycling of matter. She sometimes thinks she "sees the world through her compost bin". For the past few years she has been photographing the compost caddy in her kitchen. The images are beautiful.

In this episode we also learn how to compost from gardener and writer Helen Hutchings-Cox who also has a passion for compost and how it is vital for soli health.

And we hear how composting, from their different perspectives, has for both of them changed their views of the world.

You can share your compost photos by posting them on your instagram account and tagging or collaborating with @compost_tales telling us a bit about your picture. Or you can email your photograph to: [email protected]

Sign up to the newsletter at www.ourplantstories.com to get every new episode of the podcast direct into your inbox.

Our Plant Stories is presented and produced by Sally Flatman

The music is Fade to Black by Howard Levy

(Transcription is automatically generated)

This podcast uses the following third-party services for analysis:

OP3 - https://op3.dev/privacy

Gavin Munro describes himself as a chair farmer. In his orchard he grows trees and meticulously shapes them into chairs. As the trees grow, their branches are carefully trained, pruned and grafted, gently guided to form a back, seat and four legs.

Fullgrown is the project and passion of Gavin and his wife Alice and he takes us on a tour of the orchard and explains how not every tree wants to be a chair.

One of their chairs will be part of the Plant Heritage Missing Collector garden at this year's prestigious RHS Chelsea Flower show.

Who will sit on it?

Do get all NEW episodes of this podcast in your inbox signup for the newsletter on the Our Plant Stories website.

You can support this independent podcast through Buy Me a Coffee.

Our Plant Stories is presented and produced by Sally Flatman

The music is Fade to Black by Howard Levy

This podcast uses the following third-party services for analysis:

OP3 - https://op3.dev/privacy

Buddleja davidii is Jess's 'spirit' plant and I think if you listen to this episode it will be obvious why.

Also known as the Butterfly Bush it's the purple buddleja that you see growing in the cracks of pavements and walls, along the railway sidings. It comes from China and the first seeds arrived at Kew gardens, 130 years ago.

Jess Turtle is the co-founder and director of the Museum Of Homelessness in Finsbury Park in North London and this plant story was recorded in the museum garden which has been built by the community. People and plant communities have more in common than we might think.

Signup here so all episodes of the podcast arrive in your inbox on the day I publish them.

This podcast uses the following third-party services for analysis:

OP3 - https://op3.dev/privacy

We're following the charity Plant Heritage as they take their first show garden to the RHS Chelsea flower show. This charity was formed almost 50 years ago and for those of us who are plant lovers, it is as important today, if not more important, than when it started.

Plants go in and out of fashion, but how do we ensure that those garden plants that we love will still be available for future generations to enjoy?

Well you could be part of the solution...

Can I dig into more plant stories?

YES! You can check out the website where there are lots of photographs of plants and how to grow instructions. Our Plant Stories website

You can also follow the weekly blog where you will get the behind the scenes lowdown on making the podcast and you could also contribute - readers have suggested gardens to visit, plants to feature, experts to contact.

Our Plant Stories blog

And you can follow more plants over on my Instagram account Instagram

Every month I will make a plant story but stories often lead to more stories and I end up publishing Offshoot episodes. So if you 'Follow' the podcast on your podcast app you will never miss an episode.

It also makes a real difference if you can spare the time to rate and/or review an episode after you have listened. Spotify and Apple look at these ratings and it helps to get the podcast promoted to other plant lovers.

This podcast uses the following third-party services for analysis:

OP3 - https://op3.dev/privacy

For this episode we are in New Zealand. Luke Gardner wrote to me saying he had been listening to Our Plant Stories since day one and he had a plant story he wanted to share.

Luke's childhood memories are of a cottage garden with roses and peonies and tulips - 'exotics' and in the garden there were blackbirds and thrushes. He has now created his own cottage garden and plants thousands of tulip bulbs each year, opening his garden for a tulip festival.

Yet the plant he wanted to talk about was a New Zealand native - Harakeke, swamp flax. It is the soul of his garden, giving a sense of place, woven in amongst the cottage plants.

Luke admits he is still learning about native plants so his conversation with Edith Rolls a Māori weaver focus on the significance of this plant to the Māori and I think connections are forged again through plants.

If you enjoy this episode and want to hear about another native New Zealand plant then seek out the episode called Mona's Corokia.

Can I share my plant story with you?

YES PLEASE! I called this OUR Plant Stories for a reason and that is that I love to hear from listeners wherever you are in the world!

You can email me [email protected] and tell me your plant story. That's all you need to do - I'll do the rest. I'll work out who we can talk to. Can we find someone who shares your passion for the plant, they maybe in the same country as you or the other side of the world.

Independent podcasts like Our Plant Stories depend on their listeners for help with the costs of making the podcast such as the hosting platform and the editing programme.

Using the Buy Me A Coffee platform you can make a one off online donation of £5 and that money will go towards making more episodes. Everyone who buys a 'virtual coffee' will get a shout out on the podcast.

The support of listeners means a lot to me.

Buy Me A Coffee

This podcast uses the following third-party services for analysis:

OP3 - https://op3.dev/privacy

Our Plant Stories has its first mini series.

I love following journeys - a venture undertaken over months even years. If you are a regular listener you will know this from my return visits to the Castlefield Viaduct and the proposed Camden Highline each season.

The Offshoots for the next few months will follow the journey of the Plant Heritage Missing Collector Garden from sketches on paper to a show garden at the RHS Chelsea flower show.

The garden will showcase the work of the charity Plant Heritage at the heart of which are the National Collection holders; conserving plants for all of us, ensuring they don't disappear from cultivation. Over the next few months we will learn all about this work.

The show garden is possible thanks to Project Giving Back which has sponsored 63 charity gardens since 2022.

So in Part 1 we find out how this garden came about and the crucial call from the hairdressers.

I think I could have named this episode 'seize the moment'.

Can I share my plant story with you?

YES PLEASE! I called this OUR Plant Stories for a reason and that is that I love to hear from listeners wherever you are in the world!

You can email me [email protected] and tell me your plant story. That's all you need to do - I'll do the rest. I'll work out who we can talk to. Can we find someone who shares your passion for the plant, they maybe in the same country as you or the other side of the world.

Independent podcasts like Our Plant Stories depend on their listeners for help with the costs of making the podcast such as the hosting platform and the editing programme.

Using the Buy Me A Coffee platform you can make a one off online donation of £5 and that money will go towards making more episodes. Everyone who buys a 'virtual coffee' will get a shout out on the podcast.

The support of listeners means a lot to me.

Buy Me A Coffee

This podcast uses the following third-party services for analysis:

OP3 - https://op3.dev/privacy