The programme had some interesting bits - the tour of Permaculture Magazine's Tim & Maddy Harland's permaculture garden for example - and I like the fact that Alys is intent on growing in a polyculture, even creating a forest garden on Gardeners' World. However I found the programme as a whole too cutesy and fashionable to be interesting.
If you're new to the world of gardening, permaculture and growing in polycultures this may be the programme for you, but there is more inspiring viewing and reading out there - just look at last year's BBC Farm For A Future - an indepth exploration of climate change, food resilience and alternative growing methods. The Edible Garden seems to only skim the surface, if that, of these issues, with Alys seeming more worried about the "prettiness" of her garden than its edibleness - of course there is a balance to be struck, but it annoyed me that she was spouting about the colour of her French Beans rather than the flavour, for example. And she told some downright lies about chickens!
In all, I think it's great that a trendy young TV gardener is bringing self-sufficiency, permaculture and polyculture to the attention of a wider audience, but hopefully this is just the beginning.
www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00s1lc8
3 comments:
wow..this edible garden looks perfect in the picture. Wish If I could visit this garden. Iflorist.co.uk
THE EDIBLE GARDEN is a new BBC 2 series that sees Alys Fowler living off her home-grown fruit, herbs and vegetables in her Birmingham garden.
Fowler first appeared on our TV screen through occassional films on BBC’s Gardeners’ World until she was promoted to be a regular co-presenter. She works well within the structure of Gardeners’ World but does she have what it takes to front her own 30 minute programme? Sadly she doesn’t and comes across more annoying than entertaining. Throughout the programme it was rare for her to look directly at the camera and therefore the connection with the viewer wasn’t established which undermined any authoritve knowledge she had.
The series was billed as being home-grown produce in a typical city garden but within ten minutes we are taken on a trip to visit a countryside garden and at this point the show loses its credibility. There is an over-long section which concentrates on Fowler and her friend building a bean frame out of branches from a nearby park.
Old cine-film effects are overused throughout the thirty minutes and within fifteen they were enough to bring own a headace.
Each week Fowler will focus on certain types of vegetables and this week peas and beans took centre stage. There was no explanation of any garden basis such as sow a seed twice the depth of its size or how often and when to water the growing seedling. Next week Fowler will look at salad vegetables but sadly this programme is so formatted that it will be more of the same and not as organic as the garden itself.
Overall, the programme just touched lightly on topics rather than being an informative guide to growing your own food. Sadly this programme doesn’t fill the gap which exsists on television at the moment for the home-grown gardener. I was hoping to see the garden version of ‘Grow Your Own Drugs’ (BBC 2, Tuesdays) but sadly it will be one of those series that will be forgotten due to its substance being loose and the style over-used.
The Edible Garden – sorry, The Forgettable Garden.
I agree Sean. I thought that the programme was too much about the trend in gardening and not enough about gardening itself. :)
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