The Garden Log

In this late summer sunset of an episode Ben visits Down House, home of Charles Darwin, considers the hybrid geranium and praises the Michaelmas daisy. Any emails to thegardenlogpodcast@gmail.com

Are the best gardens designed or created? Why are there beetles crawling on my World of Interiors magazine? What cut flowers would go with my collection of pornographic postcards? These and other important questions answered in the guide to effortless good taste. For more of this sort of thing join me at https://www.thegardencollective.uk/ben-dark/

Two very different 3am trips to the garden this week as heat gives way to rain. Also, using soft cuttings and plastic cups to make plants from plants, some Musa basjoo, some Clerodendrum trichotomum, some Solanum laciniatum and some flower crab spiders, plus of course, aspidistra: ‘They’re a dashed important subject,' And here's the link to the How to Academy event: https://tickets.howtoacademy.com/the-epic-family-history-of-plants-tickets/worldwide-live-stream/2026-10-27-18-00 Love to all you gardeners and gardening people

How will our gardens look in the future? Ben visits the new garden in Grosvenor Square with its Nigel Dunnett planting to find out. Also featuring: tragedy at bathtime; some borrowed seedlings; a 4000 year old stumpery and Tom Stoppard's Arcadia at the Duke of York Theatre. And if you enjoyed any of that then of course you must pre order my book https://www.penguin.co.uk/books/463428/green-kingdom-by-dark-ben/9781847928337

Is Thomas Knight the greatest villain in the history of fruit growing? And how does a Frenchman's marriage influence the rose gardens of England? These and other very important questions answered in an episode of The Garden Log recorded in the bleached white of a Herefordshire summer. If you enjoyed any of this history, gardening and plants podcast then consider preordering my book here: https://www.penguin.co.uk/books/463428/green-kingdom-by-dark-ben/9781847928337

We find ourselves at the mercy of forces beyond our control and hide from the wind and sun under a leafy bowers of the Baroque garden at Gammel Holtegård. A gardening podcast. Here is the mega-discount for Americans https://www.amazon.com/Green-Kingdom-Family-History-Plants-ebook/dp/B0H5D7H8PZ/ref=sr_1_1?crid=RP2TBN1HHA7K&dib=eyJ2IjoiMSJ9.Bo_HP2EzIae79kSPW1fmkfmTi9cnIVFFedPWaFTKxy0IhNjqQnZmyw-9-Z9S3g2jUQyqpYp_2RZl8cdrCj0pn2uM4vQuzbP_WVV8Qfhn4oqoQqDoC8jNUq0lTckYckglCI7jTvkCL2wOhWxoyDf544YrlxKILoJeqIL-hlNBtaY.JA2A3bZ2AXgmhMakyG53ufPM7AVr6d6RpTFwXDD6vsM&dib_tag=se&keywords=green+kingdom+a+family+history+of+plants&qid=1785172825&s=books&sprefix=green+kingdom+a+family+history+of+plan%2Cstripbooks%2C349&sr=1-1 Lots of love

Just after the summer's hinge, Ben eats his neigbours' soft fruit, considers the lily and reads that all-time classic of garden writing The Education of a Gardener. Here's the link to the Garden Collective: https://www.thegardencollective.uk/ben-dark/ Green Kingdom here: https://www.thegardencollective.uk/ben-dark/

Welcome to season 2 of the Garden Log. Ben says goodbye to the Danish garden and prepares to return to London. Featuring, seeds, clones and the horticultural spirits that linger when we leave.

In this excellent episode Ben finds roses like cats, lawns like dunes and flowers like clothes pegs. Also featuring a few simple tricks to stop things dying.

Its a sultry spring day on the Garden Log. We muse on the kindness of strangers, advise on planting for a rubble-strewn drive and yearn for romance. https://ko-fi.com/bendark linktr.ee/bendark

In this recreation of a lost walk Ben visits the garden of G. N Brandt (deceased) who brought the arts and crafts movement to Denmark and whose modest orchard-watergarden-woodland survives in the suburbs north of Copenhagen. https://ko-fi.com/bendark

Its spring and Ben is gardening hard. In a special dispatch from the flowerbeds he reports on sparrows, cosmos and creeping jenny. Also featuring a trip to the fairground, tabloid libel and a woman named X

Ben discusses Ornithogolum, irises, poppies and golden fleece. Also featuring a trip to the Boboli gardens in Florence and a reading from The Grove: A Nature Odyssey in 19 1/2 Front Gardens - recently described by The Daily Telegraph as 'the best gardening book of 2022' and available to order from everywhere here: linktr.ee/bendark https://ko-fi.com/bendark

In this special episode of The Garden Log Ben walks out one mid-spring morning in search of beauty and blossom. The pavements brings him plants, thoughts, birdsong and some sort of helicopter, all of which are lovingly reported on. For more of this sort of thing try The Grove: Available to order now: https://www.waterstones.com/book/the-grove/ben-dark/9781784727383

The garden log comes out in favour of seed heads, weeds some beds, throws some droops, sees some shoots - you know, gardening stuff! For events tickets go here - https://linktr.ee/bendark

What's more tangled: a neglected climber or or human morality? The Garden Log sticks its head into thorns and finds out. https://ko-fi.com/bendark http://linktr.ee/bendark

Ben takes to the seed compost, hunts cactus through the snow and talks about his new book, which, by the way, is available to buy here! https://linktr.ee/bendark

Celebrate the return of the Garden Log with some of your favourite shrubs! Plus mulch shovelling, cotinus and some dodgey but lovable carex

In this starling-squalled episode of the Garden Log Ben is turned away from the botanic garden and makes his way to the mountains of Italy to talk about vegetables, olives and the Villa Cimbrone https://ko-fi.com/bendark

Ben tours the fruit trees of Bernstorff Slotshave, discovers a nuttery and uses it to muse on pruning, ivy, bees, wasps, dogs, figs, cliffs and trees. https://ko-fi.com/bendark