1 00:00:36,060 --> 00:00:39,843 CHARLIE BANCROFT: It's Sunday the 14th of January, my Dad's 2 00:00:39,884 --> 00:00:44,712 birthday, happy birthday. We set off this morning, early morning 3 00:00:44,845 --> 00:00:47,369 from the campsite at Cradle Mountain. 4 00:00:48,892 --> 00:00:55,947 We're surrounded by tree ferns which are mammoths and all 5 00:00:55,994 --> 00:00:58,806 different types of ferns. It's really cool and damp and it's 6 00:00:58,869 --> 00:01:03,320 just amazing kind of environment to walk around in so different 7 00:01:03,359 --> 00:01:05,601 to the environments that we've been to already. 8 00:01:09,124 --> 00:01:11,304 ROSIE HOLDSWORTH: This story is one that has been growing with 9 00:01:11,305 --> 00:01:15,453 us for a long time, with the seeds being sown almost 100 10 00:01:15,507 --> 00:01:15,953 years ago. 11 00:01:17,132 --> 00:01:21,460 It takes place in a faraway land with blood-sucking beasts, rope 12 00:01:21,523 --> 00:01:26,617 bridges, waterfalls and poisonous plant life. I'm Ranger 13 00:01:26,663 --> 00:01:31,933 Rosie Holdsworth. Welcome to the wild tale of the plant hunters. 14 00:01:40,658 --> 00:01:43,978 The voice you heard at the start is that of Charlie Bancroft, a 15 00:01:43,994 --> 00:01:48,916 gardener from Nymans in West Sussex, who in 2018, alongside a 16 00:01:48,963 --> 00:01:51,994 team of botanists from across the UK and Ireland, were 17 00:01:52,010 --> 00:01:56,322 presented with a discovery. The diary and collecting notes of a 18 00:01:56,338 --> 00:01:57,666 Mr Harold Comber. 19 00:02:00,448 --> 00:02:04,754 CHARLIE BANCROFT: Harold Comber went on two trips, one to Chile 20 00:02:05,012 --> 00:02:08,739 in I think 1925 and then he went to Tasmania and stayed there for 21 00:02:08,754 --> 00:02:09,200 a year. 22 00:02:09,981 --> 00:02:12,082 ROSIE HOLDSWORTH: The Comber family have played an important 23 00:02:12,121 --> 00:02:15,121 role in the history of Nymans and its ornate gardens and 24 00:02:15,161 --> 00:02:15,700 grounds. 25 00:02:16,442 --> 00:02:18,973 CHARLIE BANCROFT: So you had James Comber, the head gardener 26 00:02:19,004 --> 00:02:22,286 here at Nymans and Harold Comber was his son. 27 00:02:23,051 --> 00:02:26,411 And Harold Comber grew up on the estate as a young boy and then 28 00:02:26,473 --> 00:02:29,661 got interested in horticulture and went on to do these two 29 00:02:29,741 --> 00:02:31,642 plant hunting expeditions. 30 00:02:32,343 --> 00:02:35,165 ROSIE HOLDSWORTH: Towards the start of 2018, a call was made 31 00:02:35,204 --> 00:02:38,688 by Mary Miles Comber, the daughter of Harold, to the then 32 00:02:38,767 --> 00:02:43,095 head gardener of Nymans. In her possession were the blueprints, 33 00:02:43,290 --> 00:02:46,696 a treasure map if you will, detailing all of the plants and 34 00:02:46,712 --> 00:02:50,368 collections gathered from Harold's 1929 expedition to 35 00:02:50,446 --> 00:02:51,181 Tasmania. 36 00:02:51,182 --> 00:02:58,586 CHARLIE BANCROFT: Harold Comber is someone that's not relatively 37 00:02:58,666 --> 00:03:01,768 well known in the horticultural world in terms of bringing 38 00:03:01,850 --> 00:03:06,049 plants to UK and so the head gardener set out that he wanted 39 00:03:06,096 --> 00:03:11,901 to kind of celebrate Harold Comber and one of the ways to do 40 00:03:11,979 --> 00:03:14,237 that was to follow in one of the expeditions. 41 00:03:14,862 --> 00:03:18,002 I think on receiving the information and these collecting 42 00:03:18,049 --> 00:03:21,830 notes, yeah, I got really, really excited about it and that 43 00:03:21,893 --> 00:03:25,018 was kind of, yeah, the impetus to want to go. 44 00:03:26,196 --> 00:03:29,599 Tasmania was picked because there used to be a Tasmanian 45 00:03:29,680 --> 00:03:32,822 walkway in the wild garden, which has been lost now. 46 00:03:33,365 --> 00:03:38,748 So it was to restore the Tasmanian walkway, highlight 47 00:03:38,787 --> 00:03:43,029 Harold Comber as a plant hunter and also my role here at Nymans 48 00:03:43,138 --> 00:03:47,513 was to restore the rock garden and a lot of the flora that they 49 00:03:47,592 --> 00:03:52,185 have in Tasmania... They have a lot of like alpine and subalpine 50 00:03:52,217 --> 00:03:56,833 flora and so that would have been perfect for growing in the 51 00:03:56,853 --> 00:03:57,493 rock garden. 52 00:03:59,335 --> 00:04:01,439 ROSIE HOLDSWORTH: A plan was hatched and together with a team 53 00:04:01,497 --> 00:04:04,177 from Mount Stewart in Northern Ireland and the National 54 00:04:04,239 --> 00:04:08,224 Botanical Garden Of Wales in the Republic Of Ireland, Charlie and 55 00:04:08,286 --> 00:04:11,146 head gardener at the time Stephen Herrington boarded a 56 00:04:11,169 --> 00:04:15,364 plane to the southern hemisphere on Project BIBET, the British 57 00:04:15,365 --> 00:04:17,849 and Irish botanical expedition to Tasmania. 58 00:04:19,474 --> 00:04:22,411 While the team headed off on a conservation mission for public 59 00:04:22,458 --> 00:04:25,481 benefit, historically, these plant hunters or plant 60 00:04:25,520 --> 00:04:28,643 collectors would have been funded by private financiers 61 00:04:28,780 --> 00:04:30,901 keen to flex on their foliage. 62 00:04:34,041 --> 00:04:37,440 CAROLINE IKIN: Plant collecting really came to life in the 19th 63 00:04:37,487 --> 00:04:41,541 century when lots of new plants were discovered in various 64 00:04:41,807 --> 00:04:42,697 foreign countries. 65 00:04:43,963 --> 00:04:47,322 My name is Caroline Ikin and I'm the curator at Nymans in 66 00:04:47,338 --> 00:04:47,729 Standen. 67 00:04:47,730 --> 00:04:54,187 People were going off to places like China and Japan where 68 00:04:54,327 --> 00:04:55,648 foreigners hadn't been in before. 69 00:04:56,128 --> 00:04:59,409 The borders were closed until the second half of the 19th 70 00:04:59,433 --> 00:05:03,034 century and there was this great demand in Britain and elsewhere 71 00:05:03,035 --> 00:05:05,378 in Europe for new and exciting plants. 72 00:05:05,855 --> 00:05:09,417 Plant collectors were sent out sometimes by nurseries, 73 00:05:09,542 --> 00:05:12,901 sometimes by private collectors or botanic gardens. 74 00:05:16,308 --> 00:05:20,198 They brought back plants to Britain, plants and seeds which 75 00:05:20,245 --> 00:05:23,888 really changed the face of gardens. They were able to plant 76 00:05:24,608 --> 00:05:27,612 colourful bedding plant schemes with some of these exotic plants 77 00:05:27,671 --> 00:05:28,190 coming back. 78 00:05:28,976 --> 00:05:32,093 They were able to fill their glass houses with orchids and 79 00:05:32,413 --> 00:05:36,343 other unusual plants and tropical specimens. They were 80 00:05:36,382 --> 00:05:39,921 able to plant arboretums, so these fantastic new types of fir 81 00:05:40,046 --> 00:05:42,983 trees and monkey puzzle trees were coming back. So there was 82 00:05:43,046 --> 00:05:45,155 all sorts of new opportunities for gardening. 83 00:05:48,708 --> 00:05:51,234 ROSIE HOLDSWORTH: For Charlie, our modern day collector, a love 84 00:05:51,235 --> 00:05:54,703 for collecting specimens began at a young age, although these 85 00:05:54,723 --> 00:05:56,086 were rarely plants. 86 00:05:57,260 --> 00:06:00,123 CHARLIE BANCROFT: No, oh no, no, no! My Dad had an allotment and 87 00:06:00,162 --> 00:06:03,646 I hated going! Like really hated it! 88 00:06:04,049 --> 00:06:07,689 But always like being interested in the outdoors and nature. When 89 00:06:07,690 --> 00:06:11,213 we used to go on walks, I just used to collect anything and 90 00:06:11,236 --> 00:06:15,533 bring it home like sheep skulls and bones of things or anything 91 00:06:15,564 --> 00:06:18,564 that I'd collect and then my mum would have to be trying to clean 92 00:06:18,596 --> 00:06:20,049 it because we brought it home. 93 00:06:20,846 --> 00:06:22,721 I always think the plant that got me interested in 94 00:06:22,752 --> 00:06:27,862 horticulture was a Fritillaria or Snakeshead and they're purple 95 00:06:28,022 --> 00:06:30,704 and white checkerboard- I don't know if you've seen them? Like a 96 00:06:30,743 --> 00:06:31,645 bell-like flower. 97 00:06:32,106 --> 00:06:36,766 Real, like how did nature decide to create this thing with these 98 00:06:36,829 --> 00:06:39,594 squares of white and purple? Like it just seems totally 99 00:06:39,657 --> 00:06:40,110 crazy. 100 00:06:40,813 --> 00:06:44,860 Yeah, Dad finds it hilarious that I do it for a job now and I 101 00:06:44,923 --> 00:06:48,641 hated it and, yeah, have kind of got into it from a second 102 00:06:48,657 --> 00:06:52,673 career. But I totally fell into it, but I feel like I was 103 00:06:52,688 --> 00:06:55,532 probably meant to fall into it somehow, yeah. 104 00:06:56,848 --> 00:06:59,912 ROSIE HOLDSWORTH: Arriving in Miena, the BIBET team were 105 00:06:59,992 --> 00:07:03,673 joined by members from the Royal Tasmanian Botanical Gardens, the 106 00:07:03,833 --> 00:07:07,462 lowdown on local flora and to get the essentials for the 107 00:07:07,501 --> 00:07:08,056 adventure. 108 00:07:09,158 --> 00:07:12,080 CHARLIE BANCROFT: So we met up with them, I think they just 109 00:07:12,081 --> 00:07:14,291 wanted to check that we had everything that we kind of 110 00:07:14,353 --> 00:07:19,884 needed, like herbarium presses for collecting the herbariums 111 00:07:20,025 --> 00:07:23,494 and you need lots of bags or envelopes for seed collecting. 112 00:07:24,072 --> 00:07:26,775 And then you need to be able to process that seed in the 113 00:07:26,853 --> 00:07:28,336 evening. 114 00:07:28,336 --> 00:07:32,877 And also because it was the botanic garden they had like 115 00:07:32,900 --> 00:07:37,463 their native plant section so I just like kind of just went 116 00:07:37,541 --> 00:07:39,689 straight there and just thought this is where you need we need 117 00:07:39,690 --> 00:07:41,369 to be kind of just looking. 118 00:07:41,369 --> 00:07:43,588 Because although we'd done research before we went 119 00:07:44,213 --> 00:07:47,228 everything was just online or in books I hadn't actually seen 120 00:07:47,338 --> 00:07:51,572 anything and so yeah it was just trying to just soak up that 121 00:07:51,713 --> 00:07:53,888 before you're on the road. 122 00:07:53,888 --> 00:07:56,450 The good thing about a botanic garden is that everything's 123 00:07:56,510 --> 00:07:59,973 labelled, so you look at the plant and then you immediately 124 00:08:00,055 --> 00:08:01,555 look at the label to see what it is. 125 00:08:02,200 --> 00:08:05,879 Obviously when you're in the field nothing's labelled, you're 126 00:08:05,903 --> 00:08:10,223 just having to identify it as much as you can at that time. 127 00:08:11,661 --> 00:08:15,504 A lot of plants are endemic to Tasmania so I wouldn't have seen 128 00:08:15,551 --> 00:08:20,020 them anywhere else necessarily, so the whole process of being 129 00:08:20,098 --> 00:08:21,036 out was a total- 130 00:08:22,104 --> 00:08:24,506 A kind of new experience for me that I was just seeing plants 131 00:08:24,567 --> 00:08:27,709 that, just to look round to think, I don't recognise 132 00:08:28,190 --> 00:08:28,932 anything here. 133 00:08:31,417 --> 00:08:33,377 ROSIE HOLDSWORTH: After a few days training in the bag, the 134 00:08:33,378 --> 00:08:37,635 BIBET team ventured out. Their first stop, Lake Augusta, a 135 00:08:37,877 --> 00:08:41,901 shimmering body of water flanked by alpine parabolic sand dunes, 136 00:08:42,479 --> 00:08:46,432 an extremely rare habitat that's been formed by winds over many 137 00:08:46,526 --> 00:08:47,104 centuries. 138 00:08:49,136 --> 00:08:52,319 With local guide James Wood from Tasmania's seed bank at her 139 00:08:52,418 --> 00:08:56,243 side, back in 2018, Charlie discovered what makes this place 140 00:08:56,344 --> 00:08:59,547 unique and why it was an essential stop for Harold 141 00:08:59,610 --> 00:09:00,024 Comber. 142 00:09:01,391 --> 00:09:03,672 JAMES WOOD: What's really fascinating about this area that 143 00:09:03,688 --> 00:09:07,735 we're in now is that we are sitting on the edge of an alpine 144 00:09:07,829 --> 00:09:11,954 sand dune system. So sand dunes are things people tend to think 145 00:09:11,955 --> 00:09:16,329 of being as coastal, but you can get alpine sand dune systems. 146 00:09:16,563 --> 00:09:17,391 They're not very common. 147 00:09:18,748 --> 00:09:22,132 But Lake Augusta is one of those spots you go to and that really 148 00:09:22,211 --> 00:09:26,636 houses a really interesting and quite diverse, quite unique 149 00:09:27,617 --> 00:09:30,140 community vegetation here and there's a number of plants that 150 00:09:30,257 --> 00:09:32,023 really only occur in this area. 151 00:09:32,843 --> 00:09:34,961 There's a number of rare and threatened species that occur in 152 00:09:34,962 --> 00:09:38,914 this area as well. There's also some fairly unique insects that 153 00:09:38,992 --> 00:09:39,711 live in this area. 154 00:09:40,836 --> 00:09:42,695 CHARLIE BANCROFT: Tasmania doesn't have kind of high 155 00:09:42,726 --> 00:09:46,351 mountains but we were collecting higher up rather than at the 156 00:09:46,414 --> 00:09:50,334 lowlands because it doesn't get as cold there as it does in the 157 00:09:50,395 --> 00:09:53,818 UK. So obviously we wanted to collect the hardiest plants that 158 00:09:53,819 --> 00:09:54,217 we could. 159 00:09:54,279 --> 00:09:57,502 So if you collect higher up, they're obviously going to be 160 00:09:58,080 --> 00:10:01,564 experiencing colder temperatures. So hopefully 161 00:10:01,643 --> 00:10:04,111 hardier for UK gardens. 162 00:10:04,830 --> 00:10:08,814 We were always kind of climbing up somewhere. And so you would 163 00:10:08,846 --> 00:10:13,580 get to these plateaus and it was almost like a painting. There 164 00:10:13,581 --> 00:10:18,072 would always be like a lake and then you would have these 165 00:10:18,373 --> 00:10:22,377 shrubs, almost as if they'd been planted specifically there. 166 00:10:22,936 --> 00:10:26,104 Probably say this about every spot, but it was just beautiful. 167 00:10:27,885 --> 00:10:29,861 ROSIE HOLDSWORTH: Having spent the day hiking around Lake 168 00:10:29,900 --> 00:10:33,088 Augusta and its sand dune system, the next challenge for 169 00:10:33,089 --> 00:10:37,111 the team was vertically, towards the summit of Projection Bluff, 170 00:10:37,455 --> 00:10:40,174 a notable peak within the mountain ranges of Tasmania. 171 00:10:40,945 --> 00:10:44,089 It's there that head gardener Stephen Herrington was hot on 172 00:10:44,090 --> 00:10:47,751 the trail of a rare blue and pink poppy collected by Harold 173 00:10:47,833 --> 00:10:48,192 Comber. 174 00:10:50,036 --> 00:10:52,395 STEPHEN HERRINGTON: So we've been climbing for an hour or so 175 00:10:52,536 --> 00:10:55,263 now and we're virtually at the top of the summit, probably 176 00:10:55,264 --> 00:10:59,083 about 1300 metres. I've just spotted this amazing Olearia 177 00:10:59,083 --> 00:11:00,122 Phlogopappa. 178 00:11:01,559 --> 00:11:05,528 So Comber collected this when he was out here in 1930 and he 179 00:11:05,591 --> 00:11:08,778 actually collected a pink and blue form but it's not really 180 00:11:09,201 --> 00:11:12,224 out here much anymore we haven't seen it so we're hoping to catch 181 00:11:12,244 --> 00:11:14,847 it again as we go up. 182 00:11:14,847 --> 00:11:16,089 But i'm just gonna- 183 00:11:16,667 --> 00:11:19,851 So this is it's kind of a daisy bush on the side of the mountain 184 00:11:19,890 --> 00:11:22,992 here but you can just see for absolutely miles right across 185 00:11:23,054 --> 00:11:24,273 the the country. 186 00:11:25,492 --> 00:11:26,976 CHARLIE BANCROFT: Stephen was amazing to go with because he'd 187 00:11:27,023 --> 00:11:31,320 get really excited like all of us about everything that we saw. 188 00:11:31,320 --> 00:11:34,679 It wasn't too strenuous but I think obviously you're getting 189 00:11:34,726 --> 00:11:37,445 really excited about the plants so you're darting about rather 190 00:11:37,476 --> 00:11:40,888 rather than just going straight up. Your trajectory is a little 191 00:11:40,889 --> 00:11:41,529 bit wiggled. 192 00:11:42,169 --> 00:11:44,533 ROSIE HOLDSWORTH: A few days in, it was starting to dawn on the 193 00:11:44,572 --> 00:11:47,634 team how lucky they were to be living in modern times with 194 00:11:47,814 --> 00:11:51,439 relatively easy access compared with the earlier expeditions. 195 00:11:52,259 --> 00:11:56,079 CHARLIE BANCROFT: When you read his diary, Tasmania wasn't as 196 00:11:56,204 --> 00:12:00,033 easy accessible as when he was there. A lot of the time he was 197 00:12:00,048 --> 00:12:03,392 on horseback or just trekking, whereas we could get roads to 198 00:12:03,454 --> 00:12:05,095 certain places and we had cars. 199 00:12:05,486 --> 00:12:09,079 And, like, the bush is just like a thick- 200 00:12:09,079 --> 00:12:13,883 It's impenetrable to try and get through so for him like and he 201 00:12:13,922 --> 00:12:16,829 talks about that so much that it was just really difficult to 202 00:12:16,868 --> 00:12:21,493 actually access certain places so in a way we had it a bit a 203 00:12:21,494 --> 00:12:25,696 bit easier I think and also with like modern technology and 204 00:12:25,711 --> 00:12:31,164 things and but yeah for him I just think quite a feat to 205 00:12:31,946 --> 00:12:32,539 undertake. 206 00:12:33,336 --> 00:12:35,258 ROSIE HOLDSWORTH: The reliance on botanists from abroad is 207 00:12:35,336 --> 00:12:38,059 nothing new and is something Harold Comber will have had to 208 00:12:38,120 --> 00:12:41,003 hand but it's only really in the modern day that the local 209 00:12:41,061 --> 00:12:42,304 experts are celebrated. 210 00:12:43,343 --> 00:12:46,186 Britain and its gardeners had the weight of an empire behind 211 00:12:46,225 --> 00:12:48,866 them, so the recognition of local knowledge was often an 212 00:12:48,929 --> 00:12:51,475 afterthought, as Caroline Ikin explains. 213 00:12:52,671 --> 00:12:54,889 CAROLINE IKIN: When the plant collectors were going abroad, 214 00:12:54,952 --> 00:12:57,843 they would plan their trip to certain areas to target 215 00:12:57,874 --> 00:13:02,108 particular plants usually, and they would in advance make 216 00:13:02,139 --> 00:13:05,594 contact with botanic gardens. Perhaps local colonial 217 00:13:05,634 --> 00:13:08,297 administrators who would help them with the logistics of their 218 00:13:08,317 --> 00:13:11,039 planning, because they were often going into quite literally 219 00:13:11,098 --> 00:13:12,102 uncharted territory. 220 00:13:12,918 --> 00:13:15,926 So they were very reliant on local people and local knowledge 221 00:13:16,145 --> 00:13:19,606 to guide them to where the plants were growing, to guide 222 00:13:19,629 --> 00:13:22,410 them over, you know, streams and mountains and treacherous 223 00:13:22,489 --> 00:13:22,864 terrain. 224 00:13:23,707 --> 00:13:27,520 The local people of the area are really the unrecognised heroes 225 00:13:27,692 --> 00:13:29,457 of these plant collecting expeditions. 226 00:13:30,004 --> 00:13:32,785 They were the ones with the knowledge and the expertise. And 227 00:13:32,786 --> 00:13:36,388 without them facilitating the plant collecting trips, then 228 00:13:36,449 --> 00:13:38,613 really, you know, they would have been much less successful. 229 00:13:40,652 --> 00:13:43,855 I think nowadays, we tend to think of the plant collectors as 230 00:13:44,019 --> 00:13:48,160 heroic types, generally men who braved all sorts of personal 231 00:13:48,199 --> 00:13:50,808 hardships and physical hardships in the pursuit of collecting 232 00:13:50,824 --> 00:13:53,793 these plants. And I think there certainly was a bit of that, 233 00:13:53,824 --> 00:13:55,949 they were clearly very determined individuals. 234 00:13:56,793 --> 00:14:01,168 But we have tended to forget the reliance on the local people to 235 00:14:01,199 --> 00:14:01,652 help them. 236 00:14:02,137 --> 00:14:04,780 Often these people are unrecorded, we don't know their 237 00:14:04,821 --> 00:14:07,082 names, we don't know much about them, but we certainly know they 238 00:14:07,122 --> 00:14:09,645 were there helping, and without their help, none of this would 239 00:14:09,646 --> 00:14:10,383 have been possible. 240 00:14:11,407 --> 00:14:13,290 ROSIE HOLDSWORTH: Recordings of the local people were not the 241 00:14:13,368 --> 00:14:15,930 only thing that was often overlooked by the collectors. 242 00:14:18,993 --> 00:14:20,821 CAROLINE IKIN: Also, a lot of these collectors were going into 243 00:14:20,977 --> 00:14:23,071 parts of the world where they didn't really have permission to 244 00:14:23,102 --> 00:14:23,211 be. 245 00:14:23,805 --> 00:14:27,040 Often they were deliberately sneaking over borders to collect 246 00:14:27,415 --> 00:14:30,649 in places like Tibet, where they're sort of political 247 00:14:30,841 --> 00:14:33,222 differences and they shouldn't really have been there. So they 248 00:14:33,242 --> 00:14:36,004 were breaking the rules a bit in pursuit of these plants. 249 00:14:38,543 --> 00:14:40,726 And when the plants came back to Britain, there was this sense 250 00:14:40,742 --> 00:14:42,461 that they'd suddenly been discovered. 251 00:14:42,742 --> 00:14:45,383 But of course, these plants had been known forever in their 252 00:14:45,406 --> 00:14:49,250 countries of origin. They'd been used by local people. They might 253 00:14:49,251 --> 00:14:52,031 have had medicinal uses or culinary uses. 254 00:14:52,453 --> 00:14:55,562 And all that knowledge was really unrecorded and forgotten 255 00:14:56,172 --> 00:14:57,453 when the plants came back to Britain. 256 00:14:57,812 --> 00:15:00,570 And they were seen as these great new discoveries, new 257 00:15:00,650 --> 00:15:03,856 plants in Britain. So there was a certain amount of kind of 258 00:15:03,875 --> 00:15:08,199 whitewashing of the origins of these plants and the peoples who 259 00:15:08,200 --> 00:15:09,777 would use them in their native lands. 260 00:15:11,043 --> 00:15:12,879 And there's also the environmental destruction. 261 00:15:13,762 --> 00:15:16,801 I mean, they weren't just taking one or two seeds from plants, 262 00:15:16,832 --> 00:15:19,910 they were literally collecting thousands of seeds. There's 263 00:15:20,004 --> 00:15:23,817 records of taking tens of thousands of bulbs, so literally 264 00:15:24,770 --> 00:15:27,790 wiping out single species from different parts of the hillside 265 00:15:27,791 --> 00:15:29,493 or the countryside where these things were growing. 266 00:15:31,215 --> 00:15:34,420 So there are some sort of problematic environmental and 267 00:15:34,440 --> 00:15:37,346 cultural things that we need to think about when we're 268 00:15:37,510 --> 00:15:40,315 celebrating these plant collectors today, because yes, 269 00:15:40,673 --> 00:15:43,215 they brought an awful lot of benefit to British horticulture, 270 00:15:43,615 --> 00:15:46,758 but some of it was at the expense of some of the other 271 00:15:46,797 --> 00:15:49,625 countries in the empire and beyond where these plant 272 00:15:49,641 --> 00:15:50,586 collectors were operating. 273 00:15:55,391 --> 00:15:57,367 ROSIE HOLDSWORTH: As well as the challenges presented by the 274 00:15:57,383 --> 00:16:01,446 landscape, the team also had to go toe-to-toe, quite literally, 275 00:16:01,571 --> 00:16:05,321 with the local wildlife, coming face-to-face with an egg-laying 276 00:16:05,352 --> 00:16:08,742 mammal and a bloodthirsty creature lurking in the long 277 00:16:08,774 --> 00:16:11,335 grasses. As the team recalled back at their base. 278 00:16:11,836 --> 00:16:14,236 JAMES WOOD: And we actually saw an echidna on the way back, 279 00:16:14,537 --> 00:16:16,041 which is, I think, a bonus. 280 00:16:17,080 --> 00:16:21,545 Don't often get to see an egg-laying mammal, but just 281 00:16:21,607 --> 00:16:25,436 wandering alongside the road, which is a nice bonus at the end 282 00:16:25,437 --> 00:16:26,717 of the day, heading back home. 283 00:16:26,718 --> 00:16:31,592 CHARLIE BANCROFT: Yeah, but what wasn't such a bonus was the 284 00:16:31,639 --> 00:16:33,373 leeches. No, I don't think anybody survived- 285 00:16:34,842 --> 00:16:37,357 STEPHEN HERRINGTON: No, everybody got the leeches! 286 00:16:37,748 --> 00:16:39,231 Yeah, so- 287 00:16:39,231 --> 00:16:43,623 JAMES WOOD: It's not a real Tasmanian bush experience if you 288 00:16:43,662 --> 00:16:47,205 haven't picked up several leeches and filled one of your 289 00:16:47,244 --> 00:16:50,611 socks full of blood. So, yeah, that's all part of the 290 00:16:51,166 --> 00:16:51,869 experience. 291 00:16:54,892 --> 00:16:56,635 CHARLIE BANCROFT: The button grass is a beautiful grass that 292 00:16:56,681 --> 00:17:01,463 they've got out there and the flower does look like a button. 293 00:17:02,041 --> 00:17:06,806 It's very dense grass and it grows in wet, almost like a 294 00:17:06,885 --> 00:17:10,579 peaty moorland and so it thrives with leeches. 295 00:17:10,718 --> 00:17:13,060 And obviously the first time we didn't know that and we went in 296 00:17:13,061 --> 00:17:16,283 there collecting and then someone was like, oh, I've got 297 00:17:16,345 --> 00:17:16,885 something on me. 298 00:17:16,947 --> 00:17:19,267 And then before you knew it, everyone had the leeches 299 00:17:19,306 --> 00:17:21,713 everywhere, which the leeches were small and they weren't a 300 00:17:21,728 --> 00:17:22,072 problem. 301 00:17:22,150 --> 00:17:25,041 I think what was a problem was you didn't know where they'd 302 00:17:25,088 --> 00:17:28,463 gotten. Later that day, you were still finding leeches. 303 00:17:30,166 --> 00:17:34,385 Yeah. But in terms of a lot of the things that we could have 304 00:17:35,260 --> 00:17:39,427 encountered in Tasmania, leeches were nothing and I think we did 305 00:17:39,486 --> 00:17:41,867 get quite gung-ho because you are just putting your hand in a 306 00:17:41,910 --> 00:17:47,195 shrub to collect the seed and that becomes the norm. 307 00:17:48,016 --> 00:17:52,797 And we did see a few snakes as we were walking but only a few 308 00:17:52,859 --> 00:17:57,062 times that you did kind of get a bit blasé about it and think, oh 309 00:17:57,109 --> 00:18:00,250 yeah, this is fine. 310 00:18:00,422 --> 00:18:02,062 ROSIE HOLDSWORTH: One of the plants that first caught 311 00:18:02,109 --> 00:18:04,875 Charlie's eye was like something from another planet. 312 00:18:06,545 --> 00:18:10,218 CHARLIE BANCROFT: Well, they have like these Richea 313 00:18:10,218 --> 00:18:16,214 Pandanifolia and they're just like massive columns, really and 314 00:18:16,253 --> 00:18:21,456 then it just has this crazy bit of foliage at the top. 315 00:18:22,159 --> 00:18:25,487 And I remember Harold Comber just saying how alien they are 316 00:18:26,097 --> 00:18:29,534 and how they don't look like anything else that should be in 317 00:18:29,612 --> 00:18:33,956 that habitat because most of the flora is like- 318 00:18:34,609 --> 00:18:38,774 You've got the Eucalyptus and you've got Nothofagus, which is 319 00:18:39,415 --> 00:18:43,302 a very small tree in comparison to eucalyptus and then you've 320 00:18:43,303 --> 00:18:47,083 got a lot of scrub, so a lot of shrubs and things. 321 00:18:47,762 --> 00:18:50,958 And then you've got this Richea Pandanifolia, which is just 322 00:18:51,052 --> 00:18:54,567 totally just this column that just sticks out. So yeah, that 323 00:18:54,630 --> 00:18:56,567 was crazy to see. 324 00:19:00,598 --> 00:19:03,097 CAROLINE IKIN: Plant collecting has really changed the face of 325 00:19:03,118 --> 00:19:04,038 gardens in Britain. 326 00:19:04,057 --> 00:19:06,797 I mean, there's no doubt about it that these new plants coming 327 00:19:06,836 --> 00:19:10,477 in from abroad gave all sorts of new possibilities in terms of 328 00:19:10,500 --> 00:19:14,180 garden design, in terms of building up collections of trees 329 00:19:14,719 --> 00:19:18,915 in arboretums, in terms of creating great show glasshouses 330 00:19:18,977 --> 00:19:21,961 full of orchids and tropical plants, creating big bedding 331 00:19:22,040 --> 00:19:23,227 schemes and parterres. 332 00:19:23,805 --> 00:19:26,118 All these things were made possible because of the new 333 00:19:26,180 --> 00:19:28,727 plants that were suddenly flooding the market. 334 00:19:30,613 --> 00:19:33,557 But of course, now there are much tighter controls on plants 335 00:19:33,576 --> 00:19:37,619 that can be brought in, in terms of giving recognition and some 336 00:19:37,658 --> 00:19:39,959 benefit to the countries that they're coming from and those 337 00:19:40,006 --> 00:19:42,123 peoples that live in some of those places. 338 00:19:43,686 --> 00:19:46,412 Plants are now quarantined when they come into Britain, whereas 339 00:19:46,787 --> 00:19:50,600 in the past, they just came in in their wardian cases, which is 340 00:19:50,897 --> 00:19:53,616 the plant cases that they brought them over with, with 341 00:19:53,741 --> 00:19:56,897 soil from other countries, with plant material, with bugs and 342 00:19:57,006 --> 00:19:58,334 worms and everything in the soil. 343 00:19:58,633 --> 00:20:01,136 Was all coming back to Britain and you can imagine the sort of 344 00:20:01,155 --> 00:20:05,358 damage that that was causing, introducing pests and pathogens 345 00:20:05,600 --> 00:20:07,245 that weren't known to Britain before. 346 00:20:09,362 --> 00:20:12,089 Now when plant collectors do go out, there's all sorts of 347 00:20:12,323 --> 00:20:15,370 regulations and things put in place so that we minimise 348 00:20:15,432 --> 00:20:18,667 environmental damage to Britain and to the countries that we're 349 00:20:18,698 --> 00:20:19,714 taking material from. 350 00:20:22,932 --> 00:20:24,464 ROSIE HOLDSWORTH: Today, collectors will still be 351 00:20:24,511 --> 00:20:28,082 furnishing private collections and nurseries but there is also 352 00:20:28,102 --> 00:20:31,669 a new wave of plant lovers whose goal is to protect the rarest of 353 00:20:31,670 --> 00:20:35,255 the rare and to prolong the continuation of plant species in 354 00:20:35,256 --> 00:20:37,235 the growing battle against climate change. 355 00:20:39,063 --> 00:20:42,086 Gardens across the world are changing and it's only with 356 00:20:42,146 --> 00:20:44,910 expert knowledge that we can work together to ensure that 357 00:20:44,911 --> 00:20:47,191 they can still be enjoyed for years to come. 358 00:21:05,511 --> 00:21:08,761 Thanks for listening to this episode of Wild Tales. If you 359 00:21:08,781 --> 00:21:11,464 want to discover more, then be sure to check out the links in 360 00:21:11,484 --> 00:21:14,105 our show notes, where you'll find loads of info about the 361 00:21:14,106 --> 00:21:17,550 botanic gardens mentioned and find a deep dive report into the 362 00:21:17,589 --> 00:21:17,808 trip. 363 00:21:20,472 --> 00:21:23,714 For more from Wild Tales, follow us on your favourite podcast app 364 00:21:24,019 --> 00:21:26,535 and if you really loved this episode, then you can hear it 365 00:21:26,582 --> 00:21:30,175 again next week by following our sister show, Back When, where 366 00:21:30,238 --> 00:21:33,347 James Grasby will be taking you on an adventure through natural 367 00:21:33,379 --> 00:21:36,035 history. See you next time.