What's That Weed?

Gardening with the RHS

Royal Horticultural Society

Home & Garden, Leisure, Hobbies

4.4 • 654 Ratings

🗓️ 7 December 2023

⏱️ 30 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Weeds have many faces. They feed birds, butterflies, bees, and the like. They spread like wildfire, but are resilient. They compete with crops, yet can add colour and beauty at times when our gardens feel lacklustre. They’re complicated – and the way we regard them, even more so. So, in today's show, we’re taking a holistic look at the weeds in our gardens – discussing what constitutes a weed, how to deal with them safely, and how we can see them as more than the enemy. Chief horticulturist Guy Barter chats about this upcoming book What’s That Weed?, the students who brought together Wisley’s ‘What is a Weed?’ exhibition share their perspectives on these rapid spreaders, and finally, author Ann Treneman gives her advice on creating weed containers. Presenter: Gareth Richards Contributors: Guy Barter, Ann Treneman, Students from St John the Baptist School Links: RHS Weeds: The beauty and uses of 50 vagabond plants Identify common weeds Controlling Weeds Exhibition: What is a weed?

Transcript

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0:00.0	Get your tickets for the greatest show in Earth at an RHS garden near you.
0:05.1	Where nature puts on an unforgettable performance of colour and fragrance.
0:09.3	The scenery changes many times in one season and our finest trees will happily play the part of...
0:14.7	The best hiding place ever.
0:17.4	Booth!
0:18.2	Put your day out of dreams in the hands of the experts.
0:21.6	It's the greatest show in Earth.
0:23.7	At an RHS garden near you.
0:25.5	Book tickets online for discounts plus under fives go free and under 16 to five pounds.
0:34.7	Over the past few decades, our views on weeds have changed radically.
0:39.3	When I was young, it felt like every gardener I knew waged a lifelong, often unsuccessful war against these pesky plants.
0:46.3	Hazardous weed killer was the norm, and tillage, which degrade soil, was a close second.
0:51.3	But weeds are ever the survivalists and they adapted and they evolved
0:55.5	resistance to herbicides, they continued to pop up even after heavy plowing. So if the war
1:02.6	wasn't to be won and the weapons used to fight it caused undue damage to water and soil and
1:07.5	wildlife, it felt like we needed to take a step back and rethink the relationship.
1:12.8	At least that's what I did.
1:14.6	Two years ago, I wrote RHS Weeds, Beauty and Uses of 50 Vagabond Plants.
1:20.2	And I loved writing this book.
1:22.4	It really gave me a chance to kind of explore the value of these sort of underdogs of the plant world.
1:28.5	One quote that I stumbled across while I was writing this was by Richard Maybe,
1:32.6	who's the granddaddy of plant-based ecological writing in the UK, I'd say.
	...

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