Telly gardening under fire

The BBC, the Royal Horticultural Society (RHS) and Britain's top TV gardener Toby Buckland have spoken out in defence of television gardening after new RHS president Elizabeth Banks told a Sunday newspaper that the Beeb's gardening offer had been "dumbed down." Elizabeth, a landscape architect and the RHS's first woman president, told The Sunday Times: "The plantsmanship, the excitement and the range of plants seems to have gone."

But the newspaper omitted to say that Elizabeth, who called on the BBC to start using Latin plant names and focus on how to garden rather than on celebrites’ faces, had not watched gardening on the box for a number of years. An RHS spokeswoman told AG: "We refute any suggestion that the RHS is less than delighted with the BBC's coverage of gardening. The RHS enjoys a close and productive partnership with the BBC. We are delighted with the BBC’s coverage of RHS shows and other activities."

The BBC denied any suggestion that its coverage of gardening had been dumbed down: "Gardeners' World's core values and passion remain the same with weekly tips and advice on what to do in your garden. Viewing figures are strong with an average of two million for the series this year, consistent with last year." The BBC added: "Our coverage of the RHS Chelsea Flower Show 2010 was described as a "vintage year" by the RHS and performed strongly with 2.3millon viewers."

BBC Gardeners' World presenter Toby Buckland told AG that he met Elizabeth at BBC Gardeners' World Live in Birmingham last month. "Elizabeth said she had 'not watched BBC television gardening for five years' - that's not since the Alan Titchmarsh and Ground Force days," Toby said. He added that Elizabeth would "see how much things had changed when she takes the time to watch."

By Amateur Gardening Magazine