00:00Tom Poutney, how are you sir? Not too well, thank you and you? I'm good yeah and we're here at your
00:04lovely garden, Ofcot, Kinnerston. Kinnerston, that's it. That's it, just not too far from
00:10Oswestry and you're open for the NGS coming, is it Thursday, Friday and Saturday?
00:16Thursday, Friday, Saturday this week and we're sitting in a lovely little spot,
00:20lovely little sunken garden. If we just do a little mosey round. Tom this wasn't
00:27here last time I come. It wasn't, no I decided to do it, it was back in March when I started
00:33building it so I'd managed to get hold of the stone. It took a lot of digging out.
00:37Yeah, well so you had a bit of a deal didn't you, some chap said you can have
00:40it for free. Yeah. But there's a lot of, there's a lot of lifting and bagging,
00:44yeah. How many journeys in the car Tom? About five, six trips. Yeah. Yeah, it's a lot of work.
00:50Yeah, yeah and if people haven't been to your garden, I'm gonna get you to describe it now,
00:55go on. Right, so it is a traditional cottage garden, there's a lot of trees, a lot of shrubs
01:01and a lot of herbaceous plants. So it's very, very well packed in, a lot of windy paths,
01:05a lot of hidden areas as well to explore. So yeah, it's a proper country gem. So you must
01:13be pleased with how it's looking Tom. It's fantastic again, yeah. Yeah, it's looking great,
01:17looking really good. And been a difficult year for gardeners? It has, obviously due to the weather,
01:22it's just been so wet, with very little sunshine. Obviously the grass and the weeds have loved it,
01:27but a lot of the bedding plants really, it's the bedding plants that have struggled this year. Yeah,
01:31and you're the man at Salet Pleasure aren't you? You're now manager of the garden centre there?
01:37Is it? Love plants, yes. So do you get a discount? Could be befriending you. And I mean they love to
01:44stay grounds, they're fantastic and that's been thanks to you over the years hasn't it. But
01:49absolutely magical garden. It's quite a big plot isn't it? It's quite deceiving if you were to
01:53look at it from above. It's about an acre, about an acre altogether. Lots and lots of little windy
01:59paths that kind of lead you off in all directions and a glorious pub shed. That's it. Please tell
02:05me you've had a few good nights falling asleep at the bar. Definitely have. Looks fantastic in
02:10there. Even that's changed as well hasn't it, over the last couple of years, different seating
02:15layouts and so on. So if you had to pick a favourite kind of couple of plants in your garden,
02:21what is it that's doing the business for you this year? To be honest with you, I would say the
02:25hydrangea, so just behind you here. Oh the white one? Which is just here, this one here. Oh okay.
02:31So there's this one and there's one that's just in flower on the other side. So obviously they
02:36love the water. So yeah, so they've done well and obviously the phlox, which are just here. There's
02:43quite a few of them dotted around the garden. They're looking stunning at the moment. Yeah. So
02:47to have a, I mean this is a magical garden and we can, you know, come and chuck some money in the
02:51charity bucket and come and see it. But to live this garden, how many hours do you have to put
02:57in here Tom? It's constant. I mean as soon as I finish work, I'm out here, there's a lot of
03:02deadheading. Unfortunately if you want a garden looking like this, it's high maintenance. Very
03:07high maintenance. Yeah and always a pleasure for you doing it or some days are you thinking,
03:11I don't want to, the last thing I want to do is get out into the garden. No, I love it. Any spare
03:16time I'm out here. Yeah. Yeah, it's good. They say it's good for the soul and the mental health,
03:21don't they? Gardening. So they say, yeah, it does, yeah, yeah. Cool. Well it looks absolutely
03:27fantastic Tom. So visitors, get yourself down, Ofcot, Google it, NGS, look in the shops yourself
03:33for details. Thank you Tom. Thank you.
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