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Gardening with the RHS

How to be a Hoverfly Hero

Gardening with the RHS

Royal Horticultural Society

Home & Garden, Leisure, Hobbies

4.4654 Ratings

🗓️ 27 March 2025

⏱️ 32 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

This week we’re finding out how to be a hoverfly hero. These masters of mimicry are vitally important pollinators, decomposers, and aphid predators, but their populations are in steep decline in the UK. RHS entomologist Josie Stuart will be telling us more about these garden friends, and how we as gardeners can help. Keeping our gardens blooming for as long as possible is a great help for all our pollinators and Cosmos shows off its delicate flowers all the way from late summer through to the first frosts of autumn. We’ll speak to National Collection holder Jonathon Sheppard for his recommendations of the best cultivars to try this year. And from one remarkable collection to another – Sarah Cook has dedicated years to researching and reviving the lost irises of Cedric Morris. These striking blooms, once thought to survive only in his famous paintings, have been brought back to life thanks to her tireless work in the RHS archives and in Cedric’s garden at Benton End. Host: Jenny Laville Contributors: Josie Stuart, Jonathan Sheppard, Sarah Cook Links: Be a hoverfly hero Help hoverflies: 5 top plants and 5 fun facts What are hoverflies? Read Jonathan’s cosmos and hollyhock blog British cosmos (seed sales) Plant Heritage, home of the National Plant Collections Benton End The Nurture Landscapes Garden at Chelsea Flower Show  RHS People Awards

Transcript

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0:00.0

Get your tickets for the greatest show in Earth at an RHS garden near you.

0:06.4

Where nature puts on an unforgettable performance of colour and fragrance to delight your senses.

0:13.2

Inspire your gardening adventures and entertain your own little stars.

0:17.4

Race you, let's go.

0:19.5

Catch Springs finest scenes while you can at an RHS garden near you.

0:24.0

Book tickets online for discounts, plus under fives go free and under 16s of five pounds.

0:33.2

It's a warm spring day in your garden and you are looking through your flower bed.

0:40.3

And you hear a sort of high-pitched hum behind you.

0:50.3

And you'll see this small creature zigzag between the flowers.

0:57.0

You'll see it land in a really sunny spot on a leaf.

1:01.0

You catch that it's yellow and black.

1:04.0

You might wander over and think,

1:06.0

oh great, I've got bees in my garden and you look closely at it.

1:14.6

It looks a little bit like a bee, but not quite. It's slightly narrower.

1:16.6

It's got larger eyes.

1:18.6

Its antenna are a bit shorter than what you'd usually notice on a bee.

1:22.6

So what is this?

1:30.0

Any guesses?

1:31.5

What if I told you that this family of insects

1:33.8

is the second most significant pollinator after bees

1:36.8

visiting more than half of crops globally?

1:40.0

These hardworking garden guests can do more than just pollinate.

...

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