Alan Titchmarsh has described being left 'teary' after a Hampshire nursery gave away £500,000 worth of plants that would otherwise have perished during the lockdown. The television gardener and his neighbours in the village of Alton received surprise deliveries of potted plants from Kirton Farm Nurseries, which launched a 'Plants for People' scheme to distribute its seasonal stock.
Speaking on a Saga podcast, Titchmarsh said: 'We had a wonderful thing happen the other day. A local nursery went down our village street and outside each house - they don't know anybody - left six or ten pots of plants from the nursery and said, "We can't do anything with them. We're not allowed to sell them. Please enjoy them."' He added: 'And do you know? I had a tear. I just thought it was the nicest thing that every house had plants at the end of its garden path.'
Kirton Farm Nurseries, founded in 1984 by Derek and Caroline Taylor, has handed out 90,000 plants after furloughing about a third of its 20 staff. The nursery, whose clients include the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, RHS Wisley and the Eden Project, faced losing its entire crop due to the closure of garden centres during the pandemic.
Derek Taylor, 61, explained: 'It was a perfect storm for us. We have grown our plants for nine months and put our cost into it and then we came to our peak season when our overdraft is at its biggest and the tap was turned off.' He said that 'astonishingly' generous donations from recipients have more than halved losses and saved the nursery for now, with many people leaving money or sending messages of thanks.
Titchmarsh, 70, is campaigning for garden centres to be allowed to reopen to save millions of plants and get Britain blooming again. He and the Horticultural Trades Association warn that hundreds of nurseries and growers could go bust and seasonal plants worth £200 million will otherwise be wasted by the end of June.
