Talk For A School

I was really lucky again this year to be invited back to Hellens Gardens to give a talk for a school. 

They'd been going to the school and building a garden with them and planting seeds with the year 3 class. This was the last day and involved some crafts and planting as well as a talk from me about growing food. 

First Garden Club Talk Of The Year

It makes me so happy when the garden club talks kick off again. 

Last week I went to Stoke Lacy, not too far away from where we live thankfully. It was a cold night but they had a good turn out for the size of their club (about 25 turned up). 

I gave it my all as always, glad to be back up in front giving a talk. I had loads of lovely feedback at the end and managed to sell a few triangle scoops and a bird feeder. 

Garden Club Talks Mixed With A Spot Of Pole Dancing...

Mad start first few days to the start of the week, two garden club talks. One on the Monday then one on Tuesday, I got home after 11 both nights! I'm writing this on Wednesday evening and I'm really tired!

Both were great fun though. 

The first was at a village just outside Bromsgrove, and as I pulled up the village hall I could see all the lights on, even though I was really early. I parked up the truck, got some of my gear and walked up to the hall. I then stood looking through the doorway in shock...

Garden Club Talks About Produce

I enjoyed a giving great last night at a little village called May Hill in Gloucestershire. 

It's the second time I've talked here and it's a great little club. 

One thing I have heard quite a few times about my talks is that is that I'm one of the few that is giving them about growing produce and what to do with it (in our area anyway). A man told me tonight how nice it was not to have a talk about flowers for a change (I had just given my talk on preserving the harvest). 

The man had a great story about how his dad used to store food down the well to keep it cool, but how a few times a year, even though it's 500ft above sea level, the Severn Bore would affect the pressure in the well and knock the bucket over!

I have talks about unusual fruit and Veg, about preserving and one about growing fruit for as much of the year as possible. I had a couple more talks booked last week for next year and already have some booked for 2025, it's already looking like quite a good number. 

If you're Herefordshire, Worcestershire or Gloucestershire make sure you book me in! 

What do you think, would you have me speak at your club?

Future Talk Dates

I have a good number of talks booked up for the coming year so I thought I'd share on here where and when they are. 

Normally you can go to a garden club you're not a member of and pay a visitors fee, but it is best to email the garden club directly to check first! 

I've added this as a tab below my header, I'll try to keep that page updated as I get more bookings. 

2023

25th Jan - Malvern Garden Club - Unusual Fruit and Veg I

8th Feb- Blakeney Garden Club - Preserving the Harvest

16th Feb - Southam - Unusual Fruit And Veg I

8th March - St. Michaels - Tenbury Gardeners - Unusual Fruit And Veg I

13th March - Bishops Cleeve Gardening Group - Unusual Fruit And Veg I

6th April - Dymock diggers - Preserving The Harvest

10th April - Llanthony - Preserving The Harvest

15th April - Worcester black pear gardening club - Unusual Fruit And Veg I

19th April - Gothering - A Talk About Our Homestead & How We Got Here

20th April - Kington - Preserving The Harvest

1st May - Colwall - Unusual Fruit And Veg I

17th May - Winchcomb - Unusual Fruit And Veg I

31st May - Little Thorne - Unusual Fruit And Veg II

8th June - Alderton - Preserving The Harvest

10th June - Hellen's Garden Festival - Q&A Session

27th June - Hereford Fuchsia Society - Unusual Fruit And Veg I

18th July - Leominster - University of the Third Age - A Talk About Our Homestead & How We Got Here

12th September - Slimbridge - Preserving The Harvest

15th September - Lower wye Valley - Unusual Fruit and Veg

21st September - Newent - Preserving The Harvest

27th September - Severnside cottage gardening society - Unusual Fruit And Veg II

10th October - May Hill garden club - Preserving the Harvest

8th November - Wellington Heath Garden club - Preserving The Harvest

13th December - Bourton Vale Horticultural Society - Preserving The Harvest

2024

16th January - Stoke Lacy Garden club - Unusual Fruit and Veg I

I'll try and add in dates as they get booked. 

Let me know if you're coming to any of them! I wonder if I should do some courses here as well at some point  in the future, let me know what you'd like a course on (that you think I could teach). 

Hellen's Garden Festival 2021

 We look forward to this weekend every year since we first went in 2016.

They asked me to do a talk again this year and luckily for me it was at 12 O'clock which meant that it was out of the way early on and I could then just relax and enjoy my day once it was over. When I'm doing lots of garden club talks I don't get nervous, but it's been well over a year since my last one. 

Emergency Garden Club Speaker!

The last few weeks have gone like a blur. ShireJam really took it out of me and it took a while to get back to normal.

The worst was that after using my voice quite heavily all weekend I really needed it Tuesday night. I should say that the kids were well behaved over that weekend - I wasn't shouting at the kids but you needed to be loud to be heard over all the children there!

I seem to be getting a few more talk bookings for gardening clubs lately which is great news for me. Because I'm quite new on the circuit if there is a cancellation with a speaker somewhere else I've been available to jump in and fill the slot.

Hellen's Garden Festival 2018

We had such a great day today. 

It's been a long hard week with my work having to take priority and wife having to deal with an Ofstead inspection at her school. So it was great to be able to spend the day together as a family at Hellen's garden festival again this year.

We look forward to it each year and it never disappoints!

Garden Club Talks

I did my first paid garden club talk on Tuesday last week.

It went really well and I received great feedback.

I did the talk on unusual fruit, veg and herbs - something I know lots about! 

I got the audience guessing and trying lots of different things, had funny anecdotes to tell along with 30 slides to guess what each one was. I'd also made up some sauce and brought in a some different herbs, flowers and leaves to try. 

Afterwards I had lots of questions as well as people coming to chat after the talk which was really nice and welcoming. 

Doing this public speaking type thing is something I wouldn't have considered before I did my first talk at Hellens but I actually really enjoy it, and although I'm a little nervous before I go on stage the nerves soon disappear, especially as I felt really well prepared and practiced for it. 

I also did an assembly at my wife's school on Friday, a very different audience - 400 children! it went well and although it certainly wasn't as slick as my garden club talk, the children seemed to enjoy it (even though I spilt a bag of wheat on the floor!). 

I think I certainly need to work on my speed of delivery (I talk far to fast in life anyway and I'm worse when I'm on stage!), but I'm sure that will come with practice. 

So I'm going to start putting my name down for being a garden club speaker or for the WI and see how it goes. I've already got another talk booked in February next year on unusual veg again and one for preserving the following autumn, hopefully this will be a way to help make all the gardening I do pay for itself! 

Anyone on here do any public speaking?

What's your tip for the top?

Attended A Talk By Charles Dowding

I do check my local gardening clubs speakers list sometimes to see if there'd be anything I'd be interested in (although I'm not a member). 

I saw earlier in the year that Charles Dowding was doing a talk on gardening myths and misconceptions (he has a book of the same title), and as I'd long been a fan of his and owned one of his books I decided to attend. He is best know for his work on promoting the "No Dig" method of gardening. 

The village hall was packed out - I think they had over 140 in attendance and he didn't disappoint. He's certainly a well practised speaker and delivered an interesting and witty talk about trying to avoid some of the misguided wisdom that we sometimes inadvertently follow.

I was quite pleased as many of the things he mentioned I already do, although maybe not to the level he does (the no dig is an example of this as for the area I garden it's hard to find enough compost and organic matter to cover all the beds with 3 inches). 

I was also pleased to hear that he puts nettle roots into his compost and doesn't suffer from nettles popping up everywhere, something my mother always tells me off about if she's round when I do it! He also talked about the pointlessness of netting melons, ho you can compost blighted tomato leaves, and using fleece to protect crops, not hardening off as he plants out. 

It was a really enjoyable talk and I recommend anyone that gets the chance to go and see one of his talks, he also has a great YouTube channel here as well with some really informative videos on there. I like any gardener that tries to break the norm and generally make our lives a little bit easier and he's certainly one of those!

Who have you seen as a really interesting garden speaker?