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General Subjects => General Forum => Topic started by: mark smyth on June 09, 2011, 05:43:19 PM

Title: Gardens on TV
Post by: mark smyth on June 09, 2011, 05:43:19 PM
BBC4, channel 116, Saturday 10.25pm
repeated Tuesday at 9pm
1/3 A confusion of names - The work of Carl Linnaeus
2/3 Photosynthesis - how scientists made the connection between plants nd the sun

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BBC4 Sunday 7pm
Hidcote - A garden for all seaons
The story of Hidcote

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BBC4 9pm Wednesday 9pm
Apples British to the core
Chris Beardshaw looks at how Britain shaped the history of the apple
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Title: Re: BBC4's botany season
Post by: ranunculus on June 09, 2011, 05:57:46 PM
BBC4, channel 116, Saturday 10.25pm
repeated Tuesday at 9pm
1/3 A confusion of names - The work of Carl Linnaeus


A super programme presented by the very personable Timothy Walker ... not to be missed!
Title: Re: BBC4's botany season
Post by: daveyp1970 on June 09, 2011, 06:21:35 PM
BBC4, channel 116, Saturday 10.25pm
repeated Tuesday at 9pm
1/3 A confusion of names - The work of Carl Linnaeus


A super programme presented by the very personable Timothy Walker ... not to be missed!
Cliff i agree,i was glued to the tv watching this program.I wish all tv was as good as this.
Title: Re: BBC4's botany season
Post by: ichristie on June 09, 2011, 07:13:02 PM
Hi all, I thought the part about Darwin and John Ray was brillient also Hidcote saw a glimps of John Mitchell at RBGE,cheers Ian the Christie kind
Title: Re: BBC4's botany season
Post by: mark smyth on June 12, 2011, 11:22:59 AM
A confusion of names - The work of Carl Linnaeus

A fantastic programme. I hope everyone, who could, watched it.
Title: Re: BBC4's botany season
Post by: Maggi Young on June 12, 2011, 11:43:55 AM
Yes, a super programme, we are looking forward to the next two.
I would hope this was the sort of series that would be bought up to show around the world- the audience for it would be pretty good, I'm sure.
Title: Re: BBC4's botany season
Post by: daveyp1970 on June 12, 2011, 11:59:27 AM
The first program was one of the most informative bits of telly i have watched,I just wish there was a show that deals with plants in there natural habitats,maybe following an expedition with Chris Chadwell,or the like.It would be good to see,they do it with animal programs.
Title: Re: BBC4's botany season
Post by: Maggi Young on June 12, 2011, 12:18:29 PM
That would be ideal for us, Davey. Not sure that CC is the one for the job, though  ::) :)
Title: Re: BBC4's botany season
Post by: Pascal B on June 12, 2011, 12:21:02 PM
Triggered by this thread I watched the program about Linnaeus and Ray too yesterday evening, great program!. The early history of botany well explained. I do however think it is a pitty the program skipped about 150 years of scientific history, DNA fingerprinting only really came into focus in the past decade and Linnaeus and Ray were only the start. Progress made by botany giants like Engler I think would make nice television too so they could have stretched the subject a bit more. Maybe even a second episode of it with the current status of botany because there is a lot more to tell and explain about it. But I guess that was not the intention of the program makers and too much in-depth on the subject..... Programs like this seem to fall a bit in between Attenborough programs and the Open University but are still infinitely more enjoyable than 90% of what is on telly now.

To give an example, they talk about how the early definition of a species came about but that was still ill-defined and since then there have been about 12 different concepts developed of what a "species" constitutes...., which directly affects names and name changes. Talk about "confusion of names".... ;)

Title: Re: BBC4's botany season
Post by: Pascal B on June 12, 2011, 12:23:35 PM
That would be ideal for us, Davey. Not sure that CC is the one for the job, though  ::) :)

I second that, a considerable part of the CC collections are made by locals for him... Would be quite embarassing for him, I would rather see the Wynn-Jones couple for such a program.
Title: Re: BBC4's botany season
Post by: daveyp1970 on June 12, 2011, 12:38:31 PM
Maggie and Pascal i just couldn't think of somebody off the top of my head,The great Jim Archibald would have been my first choice but never mind.As long as its not Titmarsh(nice chap but he's on everything). ;D
Title: Re: BBC4's botany season
Post by: Tim Ingram on June 14, 2011, 08:58:58 PM
Timothy Walker was a superb presenter for 'A Confusion of Names'. I particularly liked the references to Philip Miller and the Chelsea Physic Garden which has always been a favourite place to visit and is small enough to take in compared to much bigger gardens. Anna Pavord has written an amazing book, 'The Naming of Names', which takes you up to the point of Linnaeus, and shows what intense rivalry there has always been in what might seem the sedate world of plants!

I would love to see programmes on plants in the wild, and in particular combining the undoubted excitement of exploration in the mountains, as much for the landscape as anything else, with the magic of discovering plants. A favourite would be something like the retelling of Frank Kingdom-Ward's 'Riddle of the Tsangpo Gorges' By Kenneth Cox and his co-travellers. It would be pretty easy (!?) to do this this with lightweight hand held cameras, and could have appeal well beyond gardeners.

Interesting to see the lack of chemistry between Forrest and Johnston on the Hidcote programme; I should think the traveller and explorer really prefers his own company and that of the people he meets along the way.
Title: Re: BBC4's botany season
Post by: mark smyth on August 18, 2011, 12:02:52 AM
Did you all watch Heligan on TV this evening? "Heligan - Secrets of the Lost Garden". Fabulous programme looking at the gardens and the wildlife.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b013nhmg (http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b013nhmg)
Title: Re: BBC4's botany season
Post by: mark smyth on August 18, 2011, 12:16:15 AM
What are the poppies abround 40 minutes?
Title: Re: BBC4's botany season
Post by: Paul T on August 18, 2011, 12:36:07 AM
Mark,

I watched it here a few months ago when it was shown.  Great programme.  Sorry, I don't remember the poppies at 40 minutes.  ;D
Title: Re: BBC4's botany season
Post by: Tim Ingram on August 18, 2011, 08:17:51 AM
I only just saw the end of the Heligan programme but was really impressed by Tim Smit's description of the Garden being as important for the people working in it as anyone else. This shows that good things happen not only by chasing money! I found his book on the Eden Project completely exhilarating and exhausting. Everything is about inspiring others to get things done!! Maybe gardening will begin to find its way again on TV.
Title: Re: BBC4's botany season
Post by: Brian Ellis on August 18, 2011, 09:51:47 AM
I agree about the book Tim, but when Heligan first appeared on the television and Eden project was just starting up, he was a spoke about his vision at the John Innes Institute.  He was absolutely inspirational and you could see how he was the sort of person who could get almost anything achieved.  He doesn't suffer fools gladly and I should think you would either love working for him or hate it and leave - which is a good natural selection!

Mark, if you mean the dried Poppy heads that were being cut, they must have been some sort of Papaver somniferum I would have thought - difficult to say with seed heads!

Title: Re: BBC4's botany season
Post by: Maren on August 18, 2011, 09:53:46 AM
Hmmm, I saw the poppies, a field of very dark red, I recall. Sadly, no name was given. :-[
Title: Re: BBC4's botany season
Post by: mark smyth on August 18, 2011, 09:54:36 AM
The poppies were deep maroon with very full centres that looked like crushed tissue

It would be great if the BBC did more programmes like that
Title: Re: BBC4's botany season
Post by: Brian Ellis on August 18, 2011, 12:13:27 PM
I must look again, although I did watch from 38 - 43 minutes....
Title: Re: BBC4's botany season
Post by: Brian Ellis on August 18, 2011, 12:31:55 PM
Well here they are, and I think it is Papaver somniferum 'Black Peony'.  Here is one of ours, if you want seed PM me before I dump it :D
Title: Re: BBC4's botany season
Post by: Paul T on August 18, 2011, 12:40:05 PM
Wow!  That is spectacular!! :o
Title: Re: BBC4's botany season
Post by: mark smyth on August 18, 2011, 12:58:14 PM
yes thanks and thanks in case I forget to say thanks when they arrive :D
Title: Re: BBC4's botany season
Post by: ranunculus on August 18, 2011, 03:35:05 PM
Am I the only person who was slightly disappointed to see too few floral delights and an over abundance of prancing foxes, swooping owls and randy toads ... especially if this was a contribution to the BBC's botany season.
Don't get me wrong, it was a beautifully made programme with an exceptional score, but I left it frustrated rather than impressed.

Thoroughly enjoyed the brilliant Everest-Mallory documentary that followed it.
Title: Re: BBC4's botany season
Post by: Maggi Young on August 18, 2011, 04:41:40 PM
Much as I enjoyed the footage of the young foxes playing in the garden, as Cliff says, it didn't add much to a botany programme. I wonder if the crew used for the programme was from the BBC Bristol Wildlife Unit and not able to change the habits of a lifetime?
Title: Re: Gardens on TV
Post by: mark smyth on August 18, 2011, 04:51:25 PM
Is wasn't actually part of the BBCs botany season but part of the new series of The Natural World. I agree there was too much on foxes, owls and toads.
Title: Re: Gardens on TV
Post by: art600 on August 18, 2011, 05:43:09 PM
You can never have too much footage of Owls  :)
Title: Re: Gardens on TV
Post by: Maggi Young on August 18, 2011, 06:13:30 PM
That I do agree with.... we hardly ever see  barn owl these days and they are so beautiful.
I think the fact it was made by the Natural History gang speaks volumes .... they don't seem to "rate" flowers much.
Title: Re: Gardens on TV
Post by: mark smyth on August 18, 2011, 06:26:50 PM
It was filmed by Philippa Forresters husband Charlie Hamilton-James. Their company is called Halcyon Media as in Halcyon River Diaries. The credits say Halcyon Media for BBC

Halcyon Media - http://www.halcyonmedia.org/ (http://www.halcyonmedia.org/)
Title: Re: Gardens on TV
Post by: art600 on August 18, 2011, 06:27:25 PM
That I do agree with.... we hardly ever see  barn owl these days and they are so beautiful.
I think the fact it was made by the Natural History gang speaks volumes .... thye don't seem to "rate" flowers much.

If you recall the programme that featured Pippa and Charlie filming the river that runs by their home, Pippa was trying to restore the balnce of plants by eliminating foreign invaders - she certainly cared for the plants.
Title: Re: Gardens on TV
Post by: Tim Ingram on August 18, 2011, 07:11:45 PM
Cliff - I agree, I was enthralled by the programme about Mallory, especially because I have read quite a few books by mountaineers (starting with 'The Ascent of Everest' by John Hunt and more recently 'Mountains of the Mind' by Robert Macfarlane) and they are a breed apart and often extremely fine writers. It is surely not beyond the wit of the BBC to combine the 'Mountains' with 'The Mountain Plants' and make a programme that would wake people up to how beautiful these plants are, and how much they have to teach us. This has been a bee in my bonnet for years!! (It's just finding the right people to come together....). PS: can I add my good wishes on your recovery too; it is fascinating how the forum can take this on to potentially erratic driving in Norway!
Title: Re: Gardens on TV
Post by: Maggi Young on August 18, 2011, 07:43:43 PM
Quote
it is fascinating how the forum can take this on to potentially erratic driving in Norway!

It is remarkable, isn't it? Yet this is what happens in face to face conversations and is, I think, one of the features that makes the forum so "user-friendly"  ;D
Title: Re: Gardens on TV
Post by: ranunculus on August 18, 2011, 07:50:19 PM
PS: can I add my good wishes on your recovery too; it is fascinating how the forum can take this on to potentially erratic driving in Norway!

You've heard about my impending trip to Oslo?   ;D ;D ;D   Only joking ... for a change!

Oh that we could find a young Geoffrey Smith to present our fantasy programme series ... the Societies have the knowledge, the enthusiasm, the artistic ability and the potential destinations.

Thanks for the good wishes ... much appreciated.
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