BBC Gardeners' World host Monty Don opens up on 'difficult time' in candid admission

Monty Don, the beloved face of Gardeners' World, has shed light on the "difficult" and "awkward" hurdles his film crews encounter while producing the beloved gardening programmes. Chatting with Nicki Chapman at BBC Gardeners' World Live, the green-fingered guru gave an insight into the trials of shooting Monty Don's British Gardens. He detailed the complex logistics, such as occasionally needing to close gardens to the public to allow for uninterrupted filming, and how these necessities can create challenging situations.

Monty revealed that sometimes they must request garden closures to avoid complications when filming among throngs of visitors, who are there to savour the gardens, having "paid good money". He remarked: "They don't want a film crew saying, 'No, you can't walk through there, and you can't do that; you're in the back of the shot'. And yet, you can't really film lots of other people in the background for two reasons." The 70-year-old further explained: "One because, if, as you know, if their faces appear - I think it's for more than five seconds or something - you have to have their written permission, and that's very awkward if there's lots of people and they're in the distance."

Monty continued: "And two, because you're editing, so you might shoot from one scene to another that are not consecutive. So you'd have somebody in a blue thing suddenly become a red thing there, and so that for continuity, it can be a problem."

The renowned horticulturist explained that filming becomes "much easier" without crowds in the background, which is why they try to shut the gardens, work when venues are closed, or film at dawn.

This comes just weeks after the BBC star opened up about his struggles with the state of Longmeadow before going on to his experiences filming Monty Don's Rhine Gardens in Europe.

Writing in the BBC's Gardeners' World magazine, he penned: "This year, 2025, is by far the driest I have known. We have had no significant rain since March, and our heavy Hertfordshire clay loam is powdery down to 3ft.

"This is undeniably a trend. At the time of writing... this last spring was the hottest and driest on record. There is no sane denial of climate change."

Despite this, Monty highlighted that while things were bad in the UK, he claimed they were "much worse" in mainland Europe. He said the severity of the situation was evident on his flight home.

He explained: "Flying back from Zurich to London in July, the landscape below me was parched and brown, and I swear I did not see a blade of grass the entire way.

"In a way, this is depressingly familiar. We are the frog in the pan, slowly, inexorably, being brought to the boil."