HE’S an oracle when it comes to all things gardening from hacks to advice.
And now Alan Titchmarsh has revealed the unexpected reason he doesn’t cut grass on one particular day of the week – and why others should follow in his footsteps.
The 74-year-old wrote a recent piece for BBC Gardeners’ World Magazine in which he said he has a strict ban on mowing the lawn or using any other power tools on a Sunday.
And there’s a touching reason behind it, as the TV star revealed.
He said: “It's clear to me the rarest thing in any garden is silence. It appears to be the one commodity money can't buy.
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“I was worried I would sound holier-than-thou when I explained that I never use power tools on a Sunday.”
However, he continued that this has become a firm belief of his, and that he ensures he follows it every weekend.
Alan explained: “I believe profoundly there should be at least one day in the week when we could go out into our gardens and experience a bit of peace and quiet.
“I want to listen to the birds singing.
“And hear the wind rustling the leaves of the horse chestnut across the garden, the splash of a duck landing on our wildlife pond, the cluck of a moorhen darting across the lily pads and the laughter of grandchildren.”
This comes after the presenter warned that a popular trend that he sees people buying into that in their outside space that he’s not a fan of.
And it’s not good news for ‘rewilded’ garden owners, as Alan claimed that those gardeners who turn their gardens into a wilderness will inevitably end up attracting less insects and birds.
Alan explained: “Domestic gardens and well-planted parks offer an opportunity to all forms of wildlife – be they birds seeking nesting sites in hedges, berried plants that provide winter food, or shrubs that offer shelter to mammals.
“Domestic gardens with their greater plant diversity offer sustenance and shelter to wildlife from March through to November. Nine months of nourishment.”
But Alan said from his own experience, he’d seen that this was not the case with a rewilded garden.
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I never use power tools on a Sunday
Alan Titchmarsh
Instead, he said: “A rewilded garden will offer nothing but straw and hay from August to March. A four-month flowering season is the norm.
“I find it worrying that misleading propaganda suggests only native plants are of any value to wildlife and the environment.”
Alan said: “This is at odds with my experience as the custodian of a two-acre wildflower meadow and garden.
“The garden is patently richer – and for longer – in the variety of insect and bird species it sustains.
“Domestic gardeners have a duty to ensure the survival of this unparalleled resource.
“Should a current fashionable and ill-considered trend deplete our gardens of their botanical riches then we have presided over a diminution in biodiversity of catastrophic proportions.”
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