Last week should have been the RHS Malvern Spring Festival and many of us would have headed off down the M5 for a day out. However . . .! But all is not entirely lost – you can spend a happy hour in the comfort of your armchair visiting the virtual festival. Next week you will be able to follow a virtual RHS Chelsea Flower Show each day from May 18th (if you are a member) to May 23rd.

In our last blog post we highlighted a variety of places to ‘visit’ from the depths of that armchair but one we omitted is very close to home – the Trentham Gardens Spring Bulb Festival. This link will take you to their most recent blog post which has links in the sidebar to all the bulb festival videos and to some activities for children. If you are on Instagram it is worth following them as they have been posting some wonderful pictures lately.

The RHS Gardens all have virtual tours available now – Harlow Carr, Wisley, Rosemoor and Hyde Hall and you can also explore (via still photos) one or two of the gardens we have visited recently such as Newby Hall and Wollerton Old Hall. Two other gardens to explore are Hodnet Hall and the Sussex Prairie Garden.

What we may be missing most though is those informative talks we have each month. Again – there are informative talks to be found online – in the form of videos (often on YouTube) or as gardening blog posts. Searching online for these finds hundreds, if not thousands, of them but they can be whittled down a little by specifying UK or allotment or flower garden or whatever you fancy finding out about. Some kind folk, such as Thompson & Morgan have even produced lists of those blogs and videos they feel are the ‘best’ or those most worth time and effort. Other blogs (some of which are mentioned by T&M in the link above) that we’ve enjoyed are

https://www.themiddlesizedgarden.co.uk/ – look for her YouTube videos as well – the link is in the menu bar.

https://www.thelittlegardenblog.co.uk/

https://frustratedgardener.com/

https://www.blackberrygarden.co.uk/

https://ramblinginthegarden.wordpress.com/

http://growingnicely.co.uk/home/

https://patientgardener.wordpress.com/

https://gardenerstips.co.uk/blog/ – do have a look at the post from 26^th April – titled ‘spare a thought for slugs in this dry weather’

https://blog.theenduringgardener.com/

https://www.daviddomoney.com/ and

https://laetitiamaklouf.com/ – known for her book The 5-Minute Garden.

As for more videos, Mark Lane (who often appears on TV programmes such as Gardener’s World) has his own website and his YouTube channels have a great many interesting and informative programmes. In the sidebar you will find a list of other similar gardening channels to watch so feel free to explore. There is also a list of good UK gardening videos online here.

Our own members gardens are full of inspiration too – Kathryn has recently sent some photos of her garden which are now in the Photo Gallery. If you run out of space on the ground, why not garden vertically as well?!

Also worth hunting out are TED Talks – this link takes you to the twenty three ‘gardening’ talks in English, many  of them are American. It is worth exploring Ted Talks for other topics that interest you.