You can find more information, photos and advice sheets on all the plants and recipes that we talk about in this podcast by heading to the links in the show between myself, Arthur Parkinson, and Sarah Raven.

Today Sarah isn't with me, but instead I'm joined by Linda Smith of Waterside Nurseries,

which some of you may know the name of due to them exhibiting at Chelsea Flower Show occasionally. They're the amazing

stand with a wonderful, almost jacuzzi-like orgy of gorgeous pond plants in the Grand Marquis.

And it's a really sad fact that within the British Isles, 90% of our wetlands have been lost

in the past 100 years. So gardens really can make a difference by

including ponds in their design.

I started gardening with aquatic plants when I was little.

Water lily is one of the first flowers that I noticed and admired,

and I remember buying my very first one as a dormant little bit of root from Morrisons when I was about 11.

So I'm very keen to talk to Linda today about water lilies and how wonderful a pond can be for attracting wildlife into the garden

and the wonderful tapestry of water plants that we can all have in our gardens,

whether they're small gardens or large gardens. So hello, Linda. Hello. Nice to be here.

Thank you for joining me. As a gardener, nursery woman, how much time do you spend with your hands in

water rather than soil then?

Mixed really because the plants that we are dealing with are potted into soil.

So what we're doing is not sending out bear root plants.

We are sending out plants rooted into the aquatic compost in a basket. So therefore,

we're both looking after the plants in water, but also potting them up on a constant basis

and propagating in one way or another division or etc. So bit of both.

Bit of both. And then your plants are mail ordered out obviously without water but in in boxes i've had them from you in the past and they're normally

wrapped in straw and they they survived don't end the post for a few days well yes we we wrap

...