Allotments 4 All

Quote from: Jockthebear. on April 16, 2006, 20:25:17
It seems to me that both GW and the popular gardening magazines have in common that they're basically evangelical i.e. their target population are casual gardeners, newbies, and downright non-gardeners. Their aim is recruitment; they seek, in the case of the mags, to add to the numbers of consumers who support a huge, multi-million pound industry.

Gardening porn?

PP

I sincerely hope that the next presenter of GW is a sole presenter.  It's the bantering about and the 'this week we're hopping over to see a million pound garden on sandy soil which you can have if you win the lottery'  stuff that bugs me.

I honestly wish they'd let Monty do the lot.  I felt that Alan was hamstrung in the last series or three he did, having to have other people come in to his own garden, and I suspect that I'd hate it if someone did that to me.  It's my mess, after all!

The other week they had two presenters having a mock argument on the best way to do something.

Scuse me? An argument? Why can't they just have one person saying you do it this way or alternatively this way,  the pros and cons of both approaches are this and that. 

I wish they'd stop touring gardens.  If I want a travelogue I'll go to the travel agents...

And I'm probably going to upset some folk here but I am relieved both Chris B and Rachel de Thame are no longer about.  It is probably reverse snobbery and Mr B is a good plantsman but I could never shake the impression that they were only there to be pretty. Certainly madam can't get her hands dirty... though my Dad thought she was lovely.  My point!

I've said elsewhere that I do like factual programmes and not docu-dramas, so I expect my wish for a more senior lecturer style will go down like a lead balloon generally, but they could try to do an advanced technique prog once in a while...

Guess I'll be down the secondhand bookshop again in that case...

moonbells (who wishes she had seen Geoff Hamilton's GW, but was not in possession of a TV or a garden at the time...)

ps you get better advice on here by MILES!

Interesting comments Jockthebear,
I did subscribe to KG mag. for a year but didn't learn much & the cost was too high for what one received. They did inform on some 'new' varieties of this & that but what was wrong with the traditional stuff?
The one subject I did latch onto & that was those 'blight resistant potatoes' Sapo.
As a first time sufferer after 26 yrs., I tried their offer at great cost may I add.
I won't be trying them again.

My "Ornamental Kitchen Garden" and "Victorian Kitchen Garden" tapes are worn down to the leather :)

Quote from: moonbells on April 16, 2006, 21:47:50


The other week they had two presenters having a mock argument on the best way to do something.

Scuse me? An argument? Why can't they just have one person saying you do it this way or alternatively this way,  the pros and cons of both approaches are this and that. 

aka Garden Rivals on uktvbrightideas. God I hate that programme.

QuoteCertainly madam can't get her hands dirty... though my Dad thought she was lovely.  My point!

Not as good looking as she thinks she is!

QuoteI've said elsewhere that I do like factual programmes and not docu-dramas, so I expect my wish for a more senior lecturer style will go down like a lead balloon generally...

Appealing to the lowest commen denominator and falling between two stools.

I am sure that there is a serious gardening/allotmentprogramme series to be made. But it's not GW.

PP

just found an i love alan weekend on uktv syle gardens.  a prog about making gw with alan(what a nice man  :P  and it's obviously quite old) and then a tour of various gardens wisley and the like..  quite inspirational and has even got me and the OH discussing it which is a first !!!  :o

starts again 7am tomorrow morning !   ;D now if i can just work the controls  :P

Bad day Jockthe bear?

I have been a pro gardener for a few years (50) and go around talking to various groups, I get asked what do I think of television gardening programmes.My answer is that in my opinion they are meant to be entertaiment but I do recall that a good few years ago a popular garden magazine was looking for some-one to do the vegetable section.They approached a friend of mine who although was a pro gardener, he had not grown veg for a long time.When he said he did not think he could do an up to date programme he was told " we can give you past scripts, you could put some new variety names in." ??? ??? ???

QuoteBad day Jockthe bear?

got out the wrong side of the vegetable bed! ;D


hey up!
we're not sposed to taked those programmes seriously are we?

kitty

bring back Rachel, at least us boys could drool at her if not the growing advice.

I sense a "topic moved" coming.......

Jockethebear, you don't need those pills, you need a platform to spout from (loved your articulate comments and couldn't agree more)! Seriously, when you think about it, these days nobody really needs a TV show to teach them how to grow stuff. I've learned practically everything I know from reading books, talking with other gardeners, and surfing the Net. (The rest was learned from Geoff Hamilton, bless his memory.) As I recall, one of the Beeb's original reasons for its existence was "to inform", but nowadays TV is becoming increasingly superfluous in the spreading around of worthwhile knowledge. Maybe that's why they've turned increasingly to providing the entertainment factor rather than information?

Quote from: MollyBloom on April 17, 2006, 16:32:37
...Seriously, when you think about it, these days nobody really needs a TV show to teach them how to grow stuff. ....

It's a fact that what is said on GW is swallowed by thousands of viewers, so much so that the Beeb now warns Garden Centres of the varieties they are going to plug in advance so that they can prepare for the expected rush - GC owners had protested that they were getting a bad name because the viewers thought they didn't know their job if they hadn't got the plants that the "experts" were plugging.

Phil

On the "celebrity" front Garden News have a campaign to get people to eat more veg they have lists of those who endorse the campaign, this week "Celebrity Builder" Tommy Walsh; what next Celebrity Roadsweepers? - well we have Celebrity Char Ladies, or I assume that's what they were when I caught 30 seconds of 2 old biddies telling someone in a filthy house that it needed cleaning

Moonbell's said it all for me. Thanks, M'bells ;D ;D ;D