Sarah Loves... Gardener's World

I was so tempted to photoshop him into a devil... ;-)

I'm already blushing about this one but I've started so I'll continue. You will know by now that I love gardening and yes Gardener's World is one of my weekly must see programmes. I have to admit I did get a bit wayward with watching it when Monty Don had left but now he's back it's fabulous!

I think my interest in bees came from the programme although slightly indirectly. Watching the programme I had become very interested in growing vegetables and in the same regard for attracting butterflies into the garden. The one thing I'd really known about bees before came from books from A.A.Milne....

Once I had my own garden (although small) I found I was getting the information and tips from the programme into practice. I did find I was terribly afraid that I would make mistakes and when some plants perished I took it personally. However reassured by the programme I began to realise that much of gardening is about trial and error. I was given a gardener's diary by a friend a few years ago and now each year this becomes something for me to look back on and see when I planted things and what worked and what didn't work. 

This is my first year at growing peppers and jalapeno's from seed and so far I have 14 plant pots full of these! They are all either about to flower or have already started to flower so I am quite excited to see how these turn out. A few years ago I had a very successful time at growing sweetcorn and I have decided I will definitely give that another go next year. 

When I had been studying what vegetables to grow and also which plants I could have to attract butterflies this was when I learnt more about bees for the first time. Suddenly I realised vegetables needed to pollinated and bees in the garden are a great way for making sure this happens. Now my garden is having the full benefit from bees and so do I. The garden is full of bees and butterflies and this is one reason as to why my vegetables have been so successful. 

I find gardening a fantastic stress reliever, great exercise and it's good to get out in the fresh air. I think when I retire I will be quite happy to just pot about in the garden. As for the programme I tend to watch it on Sky+ catch up with a mug of tea and a couple of chocolate hobnobs. My notebook and pencil are never too far away to catch those very important tips!

There is a downside to having butterflies in your garden as they will lay their eggs over your plants, especially lettuces and the like so you will have to check on such plants frequently and remove the eggs. If you don't...expect a very hungry caterpillar will have a nice feast!