How your dog could be the star of the Chelsea Flower Show
BBC Radio 2 want you to send a photo of your dog for their Chelsea Flower Show Garden.
BBC Radio 2 want you to send a photo of your dog for their Chelsea Flower Show Garden.
This morning on The Scott Mills Breakfast Show, Jo Whiley stopped by to help launch Radio 2’s Puploader and share how listeners — and their beloved dogs — can get involved in the RHS and Radio 2 Dog Garden, set to debut at the world-famous RHS Chelsea Flower Show this May.
With the UK’s well-known passion for dogs and gardening, Radio 2 and the RHS have teamed up with Monty Don, who is designing his first-ever garden for the Chelsea Flower Show — a space created especially with dogs in mind. It’s designed to lift spirits and celebrate the special bond between people, their pets, and the gardens they enjoy together.
As an avid gardener herself, Jo joined Scott to unveil the Puploader — a fun way for Radio 2 listeners to upload photos of their cherished canine companions. A selection of these adorable dog pics will be featured in a special section of the Dog Garden. To take part, head to www.bbc.co.uk/r2puploader and follow the simple steps to submit your photo.
Jo’s also been asking listeners on her evening show (Monday to Thursday, 7–9pm) to suggest songs for a special dog-themed playlist, which will be played in a charming dog-inspired house within the garden itself.
Jo Whiley says: “For the RHS and Radio 2 Dog Garden at Chelsea Flower Show, we will have a very special dog house for all your very special dogs. People will be able to walk around and look at the garden and see these beloved dogs, and we absolutely want the Radio 2 listeners’ pups to be represented. So we’d love you to go to Puploader to send in a photograph of you and your dog so everybody can see them!”
The RHS and Radio 2 Dog Garden hopes to inspire the millions of dog lovers in the UK to create their own green havens for them and their pets. Monty wants the garden to be both an exemplar of all the things that dogs love - regardless of horticultural fashion - and also a beautiful space that any dog owner would love. At the centre of the garden will be a neatly mown lawn which, whilst tended, is essential for canine sprawling, sleeping, rolling, flopping, itching and chasing balls, whilst a large tree will cast shade on the grass to stretch out under on a warm afternoon. The lawn will drift into longer grass planted with ornamental spring flowering bulbs to create more of a tameflower meadow than a wildflower meadow and brick paths will run straight creating vistas, with one providing the route through the garden for visitors and another at right angles to this leading to the summerhouse.
The RHS and Radio 2 Dog Garden will live on after Chelsea Flower Show at Battersea Dogs & Cats Home for all the rescue dogs and the people who work and volunteer there to enjoy for generations to come. As Patron, Her Majesty The Queen’s adopted Jack Russell Terriers, Beth and Bluebell, will feature on the path in the garden.
