Got some great feedback on my talk at Southport Flower Show - 'How Gardens Beat Stress'. The talks were held in the grand floral marquee this year so we got lots of people who just happened to walk by and ended up sitting down to listen. Lots of people came up to me afterwards to say how their gardens had helped them through stressful situations such as illness, bereavement and redundancy. Many were surprised by the study showing people recover from surgery quicker and use fewer painkillers; also the study that showed office workers are less stressed if they have a garden. With stress costing uk plc £530 million per year (HSE 2005/6) it's the most costly disease in Europe (UN 2004). 

The current credit crunch could mean companies and councils make false economies by cutting expenditure on parks and gardens only to have to pick up the tab for the resulting increases in stress related illnesses.

Hi, you’ve caught me in the middle of organising speakers for this year's Southport Flower show.

I’ve just heard from Richard Sneesby so fingers crossed, we can finalise arrangements. Author, lecturer and professional Garden Designer/Landscape Architect, you may have seen him on the TV series 'real gardens'. This showed how a professional garden designer works ~ clue the finished garden lasts a lot longer than a ground force programme.

Richard is course leader in the Garden Design degree course at University College Falmouth. Many of his students sent in entries to this year’s Southport Flower Show student design competition.

Last year there were half a dozen entries from Myerscough College so I accepted the job of judge, thinking it would take a couple of hours. This year the number and standard of entries to the competition was the highest it’s ever been. 26 students from all around the count... Read more