Author Topic: BBC Allotment programmes (Read 9562 times)

Colin_Bellamy-Wood · « **on:** September 24, 2003, 21:53:44 »

Several of you will recall that I emailed the BBC "commissioning" to ask for a repeat of the programme of 15th August and for a short series on allotments. I have had their reply :

Thank you for your email re:allotments and your suggestion of a series about allotments.

We're grateful for your thoughts though must admit that currently it is unlikely a series would be dedicated to allotments. We have to ensure that all our programmes are relevant to a "universal" British audience and I'm afraid a series about allotments - though of public service - may be a little niche.

Thanks again for your interest and we're very glad you enjoyed the programme you saw.

Nicky Colton
Development Executive
Factual Commissioning
0208 752 7610
nicky.colton@bbc.co.uk

Palefire · « **Reply #1 on:** September 24, 2003, 22:12:41 »

Can't they make GW another 15 minutes long and have a more extensive section on veggies/fruits? I really have enjoyed the (if a little short) sections on growing your own on GW this last series - even if I was madly jealous of the greenhouse, potting house, multiple compost heaps and huge beds devoted to it!!
Palefire

xxx

Doris_Pinks · « **Reply #2 on:** September 24, 2003, 22:17:42 »

We should make our own!
Sell it to the other side!! :o

teresa · « **Reply #3 on:** September 25, 2003, 22:19:23 »

You tried Colin

they are concerned with ratings rather than content. Most garden programs are go garden centre buy plants and put them in. >:(
I stood behind a young couple in a DIY store they were looking at a seed stand and one says to the other how do you grow it. ::)

Says it all not all can afford to go garden centres I wish the program makers would realise this. >:(

A while ago I watched a program where a cook, and vedge retailer went around lotties and talked to the people about the plants and growing them and at the end of the program they cooked a meal from the goods out of the lottie I did enjoy that but cannot remember the programs name. :)

Teresa

LynneA · « **Reply #4 on:** September 26, 2003, 20:20:38 »

They're worried they may have unearthed yet another underbelly of anti-government insurgency.

We need a proper programme on veg - is Discovery could do it with the guys from Veg Talk (a Radio 4 show) maybe Channel 5 can be convinced it's radical enough for them!

LynneA · « **Reply #5 on:** September 26, 2003, 20:22:45 »

They're worried they may have unearthed yet another underbelly of anti-government insurgency.

We need a proper programme on veg - is Discovery could do it with the guys from Veg Talk (a Radio 4 show) maybe Channel 5 can be convinced it's radical enough for them!

Ceri · « **Reply #6 on:** September 27, 2003, 11:36:54 »

If they did the programme well, and did not confine it too narrowly to allotments but to veg growing systems in general I reckon they would get the ratings - none of my neighbours are big veg growers but they all grow something - peas, beans, rhubarb, herbs in their gardens. Weren't Monty's Fork to Fork, River Cottage (not just veg I grant you, but a fair whack of it), The Victorian Kitchen Garden all popular and based around growing food to eat. The upsurge in interest in all forms of gardening certainly includes veg. The beeb has responded to only part of the interest - the gardens to look at bit, and not the productive bit. Monty et al can come and help me plan by plot any day!

Ed^Chigliak · « **Reply #7 on:** September 28, 2003, 01:49:26 »

Let me think now....

SOS allotments... rapid makeover

Dream allotments... pink glitter paths

Allotment survivor... grow food or die

Video allotment... amature video shorts

Plot swap... different countries different climates

Allotment X... crop circles and aliens

Down the lottie... sitcom

Ed^

Ceri · « **Reply #8 on:** September 28, 2003, 10:24:05 »

Having watched that daft Rosemary & Thyme the other night, perhaps the request best not go to ITV - this programme was based on an allotment where the blind murdered victim grew flowers, another holder used his lottie to store drugs and drug money, another one was a reclusive ex-stock broker who lived on his, and another one introduced weedkiller to the water system. And we worry about vandals!!

Colin_Bellamy-Wood · « **Reply #9 on:** September 28, 2003, 23:01:59 »

Hi Cerig, I know what you mean by the story line, but I watch it because I'm in love with Felicity Kendal, and have been for years.

Did you know that the "technical" person behind the plants etc is Pippa Greenwood from the BBC?

LynneA · « **Reply #10 on:** September 28, 2003, 23:06:09 »

If our site is anything to go by, there's certainly plenty of comic potential in allotments - organics versus chemicals, all the various people who hate each other's guts, and of course our site sec, who now the cukes are over, has taken to handing out books to keep us sweet ::)

All we want is our quota of four skips a year.

And considering both Eastenders and Corrie have had stories relating to lotties, there is awareness. Now give us the airwaves!

busy_lizzie · « **Reply #11 on:** October 08, 2003, 23:44:25 »

Hi all, The BBC Radio 2s Jeremy Vine show has adopted an allotment - its in Wales,and they are having a special feature on it on tomorrows programme. Intend to e-mail and ask about lack of TV gardening programmes on Veggie growing, as surely lots of people grow veggies, and enough would be interested in their own programme. The BBC have four TV channels you would think there would be space on one of them. I agree about the silly "Rosemary and Thyme", what a waste of two good actresses - it is farcical! Busy_ lizzie.

teresa · « **Reply #12 on:** October 08, 2003, 23:59:32 »

I to heard on the radio about adopt and allotment.
I did wonder if I had heard it right ? how can you adopt a lottie?.
Pity Monty Don does not adopt one, watching him in Fork to Fork he was good but GW waste of time. His enegy in FTF was exciting but GW its gone.
But if we all think about it we all adopt our lotties,they are our children, we feed-water-clean-sow-harvest and worry just like we do with children.
Teresa

Hugh_Jones · « **Reply #13 on:** October 15, 2003, 02:19:58 »

I can just imagine it. The Beeb proudly announces a new Friday evening programme, with GW, Groundforce and How To Be A Gardener all joining forces to "Do Allotments".

Scene opens with Tommy busy cutting the planks for the decking over the onion bed (to stop us getting our shoes muddy) while Charley is busy constructing a water feature among the brassicas - there will also be a small stream meandering between the potato rows (for irrigation purposes).

Meanwhile AT is busy explaining to us that we can easily tell whether our soil is acid or alkaline by whether our Hydrangeas are pink or blue (goodness knows what we are to think if we have Freudenstein or Seringa, which are pink whatever the pH)

And to top it off, there is old heartthob in person, MD, all engaging smiles and curly locks, carefully showing us how to put leaves in a wire cage and water them with the hosepipe - `cos we have to be shown how to do things like that.

Roll on; I just can`t wait. It`ll be the best laugh since Monty Python

merv · « **Reply #14 on:** October 15, 2003, 18:57:57 »

Hey guys :)

Don't knock it Hugh. There is quite a movement toward the Allotment Garden as a creditable concept. We are using "Green Prescriptions" to get doctors to give 1/4 plots, no insistance on the % of veg to flowers, the incorporation of small wildlife habitats eg, sunken baths for frogs and the whole idea of giving yourself space for chairs and decorative stuff for relaxation in the Health for All format.

Easy Allotments are also being pushed. eg, why dig a trench for potatoes or runner beans when they can be planted with a trowel? For 2 years I had a NO DIG plot..it went well. What I mean by no dig was, that I just covered the whole plot with lots of muck and then only dug/planted the little bit or row required for the plants

Hugh_Jones · « **Reply #15 on:** October 15, 2003, 21:21:19 »

Merv, I really despair. It`s not allotments I`m knocking; why on earth would I want to do that?. No, its those prats on the compulsory licence fee channel who think that:-

(a) Gardens have to be covered with carpentry and patios and `features`, or

(b) They can show us a vista of 5 acres of Capability Brown`s or Gertude Jekyll`s finest and then tell us that our humble garden will look like that, or

(c) Try to tempt us to go and spend a fortune at the garden centre, (usually goes with (b)), or

(d) Think that we can`t rake up a few leaves and put them in a bin unless a bloke with an engaging smile and curly hair demonstrates it to us on tele, or

(e) Oversimplifies something to the point where it becomes nonsense, or

(f) Introduce `experts` who just talk nonsense anyway, (if you wish I can list several instances of this)

They never talk about useful or important things, such as how we are supposed to deal with the pernicious bugs, fungi and weeds now that the European Soviet Union has made everything that worked illegal, or the respective n.p.k. analyses of compost, horse manure, farmyard manure etc, or the effects on pH levels of the various organic or inorganic fertilizers, all of which would be of far more benefit to the average lottie than the stuff which they usually come up with, however engaging the smile that delivers it.

merv · « **Reply #16 on:** October 16, 2003, 15:31:03 »

Ah ha, I see.

Like ifn I see another house/room/patio/decking makeover by peeps with shirt sleeves that reach to the ground, I will puke. Whilst the real issues of the destruction of our open spaces, are shunted to the back because it is not sexy.

settler · « **Reply #17 on:** December 29, 2004, 22:48:07 »

hi folks what about contacting the company that made the allotment series and asking for a copy for us all

what do ya think ??? ??? ???

frannie · « **Reply #18 on:** February 01, 2005, 13:17:49 »

of course we're catered for - they are always having re-runs of the good life on UK gold!

wardy · « **Reply #19 on:** February 02, 2005, 08:16:16 »

:)I'm new to this forum and I'm just trying to get the feel of things and find my way around. Not found out how to post a photo yet though. Speaking of lack of allotment programmes, I've just got hold of a copy of a series run by ITV West called the Allotment. They've published it on DVD available by mail order and I think it's good - especially for a novice allotmenteer like me. I like it because you can keep dipping back in to it and don't have to watch it all at once. Someone on another forum (I think) said that's "it's not very dynamic "but I think that's why I like it. The people on it aren't actors or experts but real people with allotments. I think the DVD's (3 of them) are £16.99 inc p and p. My copy was ordered off the internet from ITV West

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Author Topic: BBC Allotment programmes (Read 9562 times)

Colin_Bellamy-Wood

Colin_Bellamy-Wood

Hugh_Jones

Hugh_Jones