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Elegies from a Suburban Garden

Elegies From a Suburban Garden: Episode 5

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Factual: Science & Nature: Nature & Environment

Episode 5

Elegies From a Suburban Garden

BBC Radio 4 Extra - Elegies From a Suburban Garden, Episode 5Search BBC

For botanist Phil Gates, an elegiac feeling accompanies the arrival of winter.

Botanist Phil Gates reflects on the emotional rollercoaster every gardener experiences as the seasons change. Winter arrives in the garden and with it an elegiac feeling.

"If we're lucky", says botanist Phil Gates "we gardeners get to experience the seasonal rollercoaster of gardening emotions about 70 times. Just 70 spring, summer, autumn and winters in a lifetime... and with each passing cycle those that remain become even more precious". In this series, recorded over a year, the relationship between a gardener and his suburban garden are explored, and the emotions evoked by each season. 

Winter brings with it heavy snows and for more then a fortnight, the garden lies buried under two feet of snow. Phil is forced indoors, and watches the garden through the windows. But this brings its own rewards as the bird feeders attract hungry visitors. The highlights include a flock of Waxings; tropical looking birds with prominent crests which migrate here from Scandinavia, and arrive one morning and feed on the remains of the crab apples before disappearing again. 

As soon as the snow melts, Phil ventures back out into the garden; young green daffodil shoots are peering above the soil, and there are the first strange-looking scented flowers on the Wintersweet. Phil has seen a small hexagonal greenhouse in a catalogue which would make the perfect bird hide and herb house, so now he has to clear a space for it; and that means removing a large tree stump. Meanwhile in the glasshouse, the Hollyhocks seedlings have survived the winter and Sweet Pea seeds have germinated on wet paper towels in a plastic container and are now ready to sow into seed trays, prior to planting out later in the year. 

And whilst Winter signifies loss and the end of one gardening year, sowing seeds and planning ahead is forward looking and with this, there's the excitement of a new cycle starting again. 

Presenter Phil Gates
Producer Sarah Blunt.

Intelligent speech, the most insightful journalism, the wittiest comedy, the most fascinating features and the most compelling drama and readings anywhere in UK radio.

Factual: Homes & Gardens

BBC Radio 4 Extra

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Botanist Phil Gates reflects every gardener's experiences as the seasons change.

Botanist Phil Gates reflects on the emotional rollercoaster every gardener experiences as the seasons change

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