Postbag Edition: Sefton Park Palm House
Gardeners' Question Time
BBC
4.5 • 1.1K Ratings
🗓️ 2 January 2026
⏱️ 43 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
How do I maintain a hot compost bin? Do Begonias have a finite life? How do I successfully grow a pineapple?
Kathy Clugston and a panel of hearty horticulturalists venture to the Sefton Park Palm House in Liverpool, while digging into the GQT postbag, to solve your trickiest gardening conundrums.
Joining Kathy to explore this historic palm house are botanist James Wong, proud plantswoman Bethan Collerton, and head of RHS Bridge Water, Marcus Chilton Jones. They're also joined by head gardener of Sefton Park, Colin Hughes.
Producer: Rahnee Prescod
A Somethin' Else production for BBC Radio 4
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | BBC Sounds, music, radio, podcasts. |
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| 0:10.8 | In 2025, we were here for the entertainment. |
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| 0:42.9 | Hello and welcome to Gardner's Question Time with me, Cathy Clugston and our first programme of 26. Happy New Year. As you know, we travel the country in all weather. We're on air 52 weeks |
| 0:49.6 | a year, but today we've escaped the winter cold to enjoy a more temperate climate. |
| 0:54.8 | We're inside Sefton Park Palm House in Liverpool. |
| 0:58.4 | It's a grade two listed glass house, opened in 1896, and a much-cherished green space in the heart of Sefton Park, |
| 1:05.8 | about three miles southeast of the Liver Building. |
| 1:09.0 | For 130 years, visitors have been coming here to marvel at exotic |
| 1:12.6 | specimens, many from faraway lands, and admire the Victorian architecture. This year also marks |
| 1:19.3 | 25 years since the glasshouse underwent a major restoration. And one of the people who oversaw that |
| 1:24.8 | is botanical gardener Colin Hughes, who's joined us today. Hi, Colin. Thank you, Well, you're welcome. Can you tell us a bit more about the glass house and its history? Well, it goes back as I say, to 1896. It's had a bit of a check of life. It went through to about 1990, 91, and then it fell into disrepair. So the glass was actually falling in. |
| 1:44.8 | So we had to close it for safety reasons. |
| 1:46.9 | We closed in 97 for the renovation. |
| 1:50.4 | The renovation come up because of people protesting and saved the green house. |
| 1:54.6 | So they wanted to save it. |
| 1:55.5 | Yeah, it's all community-based, starting it all off, get it all going. |
... |
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