Propagating at Kew Gardens
Sarah Demain has her dream job and in this Offshoot episode she tells us all about it.
Look carefully and you can see an emerging seed - the first of fifty in this pot!
Episode Summary
Sarah or Sal as she is known to many, has worked in horticulture for 30 years. When she came to Kew to do the diploma in 2016, they asked her what she wanted to get from her studies and she replied: propagation, propagation, propagation! Her curiosity had first been aroused as a 6 year old wondering why the neighbour’s garden had bluebells whilst theirs did not. A year later and those bluebells had spread themselves into her garden and she was hooked on propagation.
Listen here
About this episode
“I like being the alchemist, finding what substrates are going to work or what methods do we need to do to enhance the growth of these plants.”
At Kew they are always looking ahead to the future. Given climate change - what plants and trees might we be growing in the UK in 50 or 90 years time? And where are such plants and trees currently growing? As a landscape succession plan is developed, you need to go out and collect and germinate those seeds.
In the picture Sal is holding a pot containing Abies nordmanniana and its special to her because she was part of the team that went out to collect it from Georgia in October 2024. When I recorded this episode in April 2025 it had just begun to germinate. I love her description of the tree gang scaling the trees whilst she stayed at the bottom, with the important task of recording everything, with one eye out for the wolves and bears.
Sal is passionate about her work and clear that there isn’t a minute to lose - we need to be going out and collecting these seeds at every opportunity. But it’s also about sharing knowledge and seeds with other botanical institutions. The meticulous recording of every detail about this seed is fascinating. She says:
“Each seed has a story: where it came from, the habitat it grew in, the conditions it faced. Recording everything is as important as planting it.”
It is always fascinating to go behind the scenes of any garden but Kew is a bit special. Just the size of the operation. Driving to the Arboretum nursery you pass enormous piles of compost and you realise just how many vehicles are needed to work an area so big and how everyone is part of a much bigger picture, as Sal says:
“I only see these plants until adolescence, and then they go out and live in the world.”
But what I love is that she feels she has the ‘best job in the world’. And though she says she would like us all to get excited about propagation, she added “just don’t come after my job”!
Other Episodes you might like
If you enjoy this episode there are some others you might like. I had gone to Kew to record Jerry’s Tulip tree story. Jerry was homeless and at a very low point in his life when on a visit to Kew, remembering the Latin name of a Tulip tree, jogged memories of his previous life as a gardener. You can listen to that episode here.
If you are fascinated by seeds, I think you will enjoy this episode by Adam Alexander, also known as the seed detective. He is endlessly curious about seeds and in his new book The Accidental Seed Heroes he is on the trail of the growers who are championing traditional varieties of vegetables and breeding new ones that will adapt to our changing climate. You can listen here.
And if you like trees while there are lots to choose from - Monkey Puzzles (3 episodes!) Willow trees, Magnolia trees, Silver Birch trees and Fig trees.
Supporting the podcast
The podcast is supported by listeners, through Buy Me A Coffee and that pays for the editing programme and the hosting platform. It is also fabulous encouragement to me as an independent podcaster.
Sign up for the blog. I have been writing a weekly blog since starting this podcasting journey back in November 2022. If you sign up you’ll get a weekly update on the behind the scenes and it also means that when the podcast is off air in December and January you’ll be the first to know about some very exciting plans for the 4th series in 2026.