Thousands enjoy flower show as temperatures soar

The RHS Malvern Spring Festival flower show opens on Thursday with a focus on mental wellbeing and tackling climate change.

It runs 9-12 May at the Three Counties Showground in Worcestershire.

The event will include talks by the likes of Alan Titchmarsh and Adam Frost, as well as show gardens.

There will also be a "pot amnesty", where visitors can exchange their plastic pots for compostable ones that can be planted straight into the ground.

Jonny Balchandani, who created a jungle in his Malvern home with more than 200 species of plants, will host a workshop for fellow fans of houseplants.

Mr Balchandani, who started posting on Instagram about his plant collection during the Covid pandemic, has become known as the Bearded Plantaholic and has more than 350,000 followers.

• Listen on BBC Sounds: The jungle home in Malvern

The four-day festival was first held in 1986 and attracts more than 100,000 visitors a year.

The 2024 event will also include live cooking demonstrations and advice on sustainable gardening issues such as saving rainwater.

On the festival site there will also be giant versions of terrariums, sealed glass containers that contain plants and soil.

These terrariums will be more than four metres tall and each will each contain a "plantscape" from a different part of the world.

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