Black fly on your Broad Beans? What has that got to do with Dog Training?

By Corrin Goodall

Black fly hanging out on your beans!

I'm settling down for the evening with a wine in hand for an episode of gardens world, yep I love it! Not only is it one of those programmes that inspires you to get outside and get your hands dirty, it's also heartwarming and wholesome in equal measure. It’s also worth mentioning here that it is one of the only television shows where you can watch people interacting with dogs without the need to watch through your fingers ;)

During this particular episode I was struck by the human behaviour change they were encouraging their viewers to consider. That's where the dog geek can't switch off drawing the comparison.

Broad bean (stay with me big city folk 😉) can apparently be plagued with a pest known as  Black Fly which, I imagine, in recent times have been dealt with by the use of harsh chemicals. Monty Don (the host of the show and one of the OG's for those of you who have yet to develop green fingers) told the viewers that, contrary to popular belief) there's no need to do too much about the Black Fly as they won't harm the Broad Beans as they aren't physically big enough to puncture the bean pods.

You’d imagine that should have been enough right? Don’t worry about it and move on? What happened next really got me thinking…I could tell that Monty really wanted to give people something they could proactively do to stop the Black Fly, something to remove them from the plant all together. It occurred to me that if you had been previously told to use chemicals to remove, and had success, then the idea of keeping on using those chemicals would be hard to shake off.  Even with hearing the information to do nothing  (from an expert and trusted source) you’d likely still feel compelled to do something about the perceived issue.

Monty Don & Ned Hosts of Gardeners World

The solutions Monty presented for getting rid of the Black Fly were wonderfully less intrusive and natural. Instead of saying you shouldn't do this because it's harmful - which may evoke a feeling of shame for the viewer - he simply said (and I'm paraphrasing here) "There's no need to do that, if you want to do something about it you could do this instead, here's an example from someone who implemented this successfully already."

Monty’s garden paradise at Long Meadow

That's not where it stops either, as many of you know I have a passion for self-care and one thing that comes up frequently as a barrier within our area of work is imposter syndrome. If you can draw the comparison here as I did I hope it brings you some confidence today. So back to Monty Don. Later in the same episode he points out his failing garlics, he discusses how this might have come to be and what he would do differently next time. After all he's working with living things and an unpredictable environment with this changing climate. Yet not once did I think he was failure or an imposter of a gardener because his garden wasn't "perfect" and I bet no one else watching did either. Instead, to the contrary, his knowledge, recognition and acceptance of future change means I have more faith in the wealth of information he holds and shares.

Garden veg for thought anyway 😉