55 Monty Don Quotes for You to Enjoy

Monty Don

English Celebrity

Born: Jul 8, 1955

Food Garden Gardening Good Plant You

Visiting gardens is bad for you. Not only does it encourage too much eating of cake but sets up all kinds of false notions that are ruinous to your garden back home. Monty Don

I often eat cakes while my fingers are caked in soil. Monty Don

Soil Eat Fingers Cakes Often While

No apple is reliably self-fertile, so each tree needs a pollinator. A neighbour may well have an apple that will do that for you, but it is better to always plant at least two trees to be certain of pollination. Monty Don

Needs You Better Plant Will Tree Trees Neighbour Reliably Well Always Least May Certain Each Apple Two

The thing the British hate more than anything else is people who are getting above themselves. There are a hundred different expressions for it all around the country, but it comes down to the same thing: this inherent mistrust of authority, and trying to topple people off a pedestal. Monty Don

Hate People Country Same Thing Down Pedestal Else Hundred Topple All-Around Above More More Than Anything Around Mistrust Off Than Trying Authority Same Getting Different Anything Anything Else Themselves Inherent Who Expressions Thing British

In my teens I wanted to be a rock star, I really did. At that time there was nothing I wanted more. Monty Don

Time Nothing Teens More Rock Rock Star Did Wanted Really Star

As September rolls into October, I become obsessed with apples. Now obviously this is provoked by the ripening fruit clustering on the trees in our orchard, but it is as though all things pomological ripen in me, too. Monty Don

Me Fruit Become September Too Trees Our Though All Things Ripen Obsessed Obviously October Provoked Rolls Orchard Now Apples Things

Tony Blair is a dreadful man; really truly dreadful. Monty Don

Man Tony Blair Dreadful Blair Truly Really Tony

Trees are complicated, fascinating things, usually older and more beautiful than any of us. Monty Don

Beautiful Complicated Older Trees More Than Any Us Fascinating Things

Sweet peas should smell. Half the point of growing sweet peas is to cut them for the house; they should fill a room with an almost painful olfactory inarticulateness. But most sweet peas smell of nothing. This does not stop them being beautiful, but they are like food with no flavour. Monty Don

There is a direct correlation between gardening and mental health, not just to maintain good mental health but to repair it as well - that's anything in the gamut from depression to serious brain damage, schizophrenia or autism. Monty Don

The biggest obstacle to good gardening is the desire to know the answers and not the questions. Monty Don

Good Gardening Obstacle Know Answers Questions Biggest Biggest Obstacle Desire

That first snowdrop, the flowering of the rose you pruned, a lettuce you grew from seed, the robin singing just for you. These are smallthings but all positive, all healing in a way that medicine tries to mimic. Monty Don

Positive You Healing First Singing Rose Medicine Mimic Way Tries Seed Robin Just Grew Lettuce Flowering

I think that the essence of a Christmas wreath - of all Christmas vegetative decoration - has to be green and, if possible, living. So the basis of a wreath is ideally holly, laurel, ivy, rosemary, larch, fir or whatever is to hand. Monty Don

Christmas Whatever Living Think I Think Possible Laurel Ideally Hand Ivy Green Essence Holly Decoration Basis

I love high summer as well, but nothing beats a perfect May morning. Monty Don

Love Morning Nothing Summer High I Love Perfect Beats Well May

If I'm honest, the thing I am proudest of is my varieties of wild flowers in the hay meadow. Monty Don

I Am Wild Hay Am Proudest Meadow Thing Flowers Honest

Organic is loaded with a sense of rightness, with a set of rules. I would much rather someone bought food that was local and sustainable but not organic than bought organic food that had to be shipped across the world. Monty Don

Food World Sense Organic Local Rules Would Someone Rather Had Bought Shipped Than Sustainable Organic Food Much Across Loaded Set

Modern man has a very abstract idea of what a wood is. I guess that if you stopped anyone on the street and asked them what a wood actually was, they would see it as a place where big trees grow. Monty Don

The British have such an odd relationship with food - and the land. I want the public and the Soil Association to see that growing things in a garden is no different to growing things in a field. Monty Don

Food Relationship Garden Soil Field See Odd Different Want Public Land Growing Things British Association

I see myself as a writer who happens to garden. Monty Don

Myself Garden I See See Writer Happens Who

A plant I have grown for years without really taking much notice of is epimedium. You know how it is: someone gives you a plant, you stick it in the ground and somehow it never presses the trigger. There is no intimacy. Monty Don

You Plant Intimacy Trigger Somehow Someone Gives Never Taking Know Stick Without How Years Much Really Notice Ground Grown

Blackthorn has wicked spikes that are highly brittle and tend to snap off under the skin and then fester horribly. This means that they can only really be part of a hedge that you do not want to get too close to. Monty Don

You Skin Wicked Too Horribly Only Tend Part Highly Snap Off Close Fester Get Want Hedge Then Really Means

I was a sickly child, and it wasn't until I was 19 that I realised I was quite a robust, vigorous person. Since then I've taken ill health to be an irritating interruption into what is a fairly reliable stream of good health. Monty Don

The key to our oldest woodland is that it has been cut down and regrown, in some cases as often as 50 or 60 times. It is one of the most perfectly sustainable resources and ecosystems known to man. Monty Don

Man Key Down Our Resources Has-Been Some Cases Perfectly Ecosystems Most Known Been Times Often Woodland Sustainable Cut Oldest

We are extremely uncomfortable with the spiritual aspects of gardening, and yet most people feel it in some form or other, even if it's a sense of connection to the greater world on a beautiful day. Monty Don

Beautiful Day Spiritual Gardening People World Sense Other Extremely Some Uncomfortable Beautiful Day Feel Most Greater Form Aspects Connection Even