Sacha wrote:

We were out last night and didn't see GW but I have to agree with
Martin on this one. There are so many food allergies, or potential
skin allergies, etc. to plants, that if every one is to be named and
cautioned against on GW, it will be a health programme, not a gardening
one. They could perhaps do an episode just on that subject but I can't
really see that it works as a 'trickle through' feature at all times.
Introducing new varieties of foods is another topic altogether and of
course, it's appropriate to a gardening programme. It's the business
of GW to teach people how to garden and how to grow good plants,
whether they're ornamental or vegetable. But it's not its job to teach
them to manage their food allergies. One of the previous criticisms of
GW was that it jumped about too much and was too fragmented.
Introducing another topic seems to be a certain way to ensure a lack of
cohesion, IMO.

Good points, well made.

I hazard a guess that none of the presenters have arthritis, or have
other ways (medication or whatever) of dealing with it. I take your
point that this isn't a health programme, even though there is a close
relationship between food and health.

I didn't have in mind a continuous series on the topic, but it could
have enough in it to make a programme, and would be far more relevant
than one on garden gnomes, for example.

Another idea might be a programme aimed at first-time gardeners. Take
seed-planting, as it featured prominently last night. There may be all
sorts of ways of planting seeds, but if a newcomer had bought or been
given a clutch of seeds, what general-purpose seed-planting routine
(that could be easily remembered) would be adequate for most of them?
It seems to me that there is plenty of specific advice on GW, but what
general routine is there that would be recalled and used, and would
stand a chance of giving useful results?

After all, we all came to gardening one way or another, and it's the
newcomers that are the next generation - they need to be attracted in.

I really hope that GW doesn't continue in last night's vein.

TF