To complain to the BBC about the state of Gardeners World!!!!!

[ingles2]

Anyone watching????
we're being subjected to a 6 yr old from Cbeebies planting seeds!
at 8.40pm!
on a supposedly serious gardening programme.

I haven't watched it yet but have Sky plussed it.

However, the new style (and location) GW isn't going down well ..... take a look at the gardening message boards on the BBC website.

I think I'm going to have to stick with Gardeners' Question Time.

He he, catsmother, i know, it's getting a slating isn't it!

It's all gone steadily downhill since Percy Thrower. Percy Thrower didn't do gnomes. Or Hot or Not.

me too Mary, I'm off to look at the blog and make mean comments

Thank f*ck for the Beechgrove Garden is all I can say!

The hot or not thing is excruciating.

Nice not to have all those wanky slow motion out of focus shots of people pushing wheelbarrows, though.

I must admit it has been going down hill for a while. Give me Alan Titchmarsh over Monty Don anytime. Alan had really professionlly trained as gardener and worked at Kew whereas Monty Don did not have any professional training.

I struggle to watch it now as it no longer a serious programme and has gone all 'popular TV' which makes me sad as I used to garden a lot with my mother when I was a child and still love gardens.

Yanbu. I just caught the end, WTF is that 'hot or not?' wall?

Can't believe how bad this programme has got in this new format. Dumbing down doesn't begin to describe it.

I still miss Geoff Hamilton. He knew his stuff, dug the garden himself and knew how to make espalier.

well I've just been perusing the gardeners world forum. The overwhelming response is the programme is dire!
Am going to post the same.

Yes, I was just about to say I missed Geoff Hamilton. I really grieved when he died - he was my surrogate gardening uncle.

I like the football analogy earlier - GW should be for Premier League gardening, not the horticultural equivalent of Lower Snoddington Utd playing on Sunday morning in the park.

If you want some decent quality gardening stuff, I've been listening to some great Podcasts from BBC Gardens Illustrated - some really intellectual debates / lectures as well as brief interviews with Beth Chatto and Penelope Hobhouse, and a feature on rose gardens in Iran.

I find GW very tedious now, and completely irrelevant to a garden in north Scotland. I much prefer the Beechgrove Garden, but the best thing of all is Gardeners' Question Time. Is it just me, or are actual plants rather lacking on GW these days? Mind you the same could be said for Beechgrove last week.

Is it me or do you detect 'an edge' with the presenters of Beechgrove, Twinkle ?
I keep thinking that they are not too keen on one another. The old boy is an arrogant toad - I was stuck beside him on a plane once.

How do I find those podcasts Grendelsmum? They sound interesting

ingles2 I am actually really glad about that - she's got talent - but what is she doing on gw????

I can't bear the new programme format. What is this wanky 'bantering' between, Toby and Alys all about? Just get on with it. It's trying to be too much like Top Gear in my opinion, which is great for Top Gear, but not for GW!!

Also HATE the stupid 'hot or not' wall. So not hot.

My worst hate is reserved for Toby talking about 'tickling' the soil back over the seeds. DH and I counted 8 'tickling' references in one episode last series, tho' he seems to have cut back on the 'tickling' since then.... maybe someone told him it was irritating....

I love Carol and I don't mind Joe, but as a gardening beginner myself, it's even dumbed down too much for me.

spot my post

Otter, I think all the presenters on Beechgrove seem like they could be a little "difficult". I was quite disappointed last week, actually, when they jumped on the quick fix/credit crunch bandwagon.

I really like Monty Don, and think he writes beautifully, but, IMO, Gardeners World started to lose its way once it moved to a garden which didn't belong to the main presenter .... i.e. it lost its soul.

I read that Monty felt the invasion of privacy would be too much for his family if filming took place in his own garden, which is understandable but I also wonder if he simply didn't want film crews trampling through it and the order of things being messed up to meet programming requirements ?

Anyway ..... though Berryfields was a private garden, it still didn't belong to any of the presenters let alone the main one and therefore they had no emotional investment in it (and I think it showed). I assume Alys, as head gardener, was probably there the most and had most to do with it but it always struck me as a series of mini projects which were frequently started but very often barely (if at all) ever referred to again, and then next year, the area would be turned into something else before it had the chance to mature.

And now, ......... a (flat) field !

Nice one Ingles

I am well buggered since I live in Bavaria Germany and can't figure out when to plant my thingies down here.

German TV is still in the 50s when it comes to this kind of thing but it's changing, my plot I rent is double in size since last year so I shall keep you informed.

Comment on GW website is that GW needs to attract a new generation of gardeners and if that meant whats hot whats not then so be it I applaud it though I don't like it.

Oh Monty, Monty ... sigh... we so miss you straddling your trenches ....

"GW needs to attract a new generation of gardeners" God that's depressing. Have you seen how long the waiting lists are for allotments? Gardening is the new black, don't they know. They don't need to do that mindless stuff, there are a whole bunch of people out there who want proper information. Look at us lot! I don't imagine any of us this I'll bet she knows her latin names...