'Sex, Lies and Putrification' with Timothy Walker

We are delight to welcome Timothy Walker back to Cobham.  An entertaining and highly informative evening is guarenteed!

‘Sex, Lies and Putrification’

Gardeners are well aware of the need for pollinators but for many people this important area of plant science begins and ends with bees.  In fact, pollination can be carried out by animals as different as bats and snails – the former is limited to night flowering species and the latter is only for plants with time on their hands.  Many trees, grasses and others do not use a pollinator trusting in fate but releasing their pollen into the wind and hoping that the grains land on a suitable female flower. This lecture looks at the variety of animals and other vectors that are exploited by plants and explains why this knowledge is so important.

Timothy was born and brought up in South Buckinghamshire.  He read Botany at University College Oxford.  After graduation, I worked for two years as a trainee at the University of Oxford Botanic Garden.  Timothy then took a National Certificate in Horticulture at Askham Bryan College York.  This was followed by a one-year traineeship at the Savill Garden Windsor, and 15-months as a diploma student at the Royal Botanic Gardens Kew.  In 1995 he was awarded a Master of Horticulture by the Royal Horticultural Society of London.

From January 1986 to July 2014 he worked at the University of Oxford Botanic Garden & Harcourt Arboretum, firstly as General Foreman, then as Horti Praefectus (from 1988) and finally as Director (from 2002).  Between 1992 & 2000 the OBGHA won 4 gold medals at the Chelsea Flower Show London.  In 2009 the Botanic Garden was one of seven Oxford collections to be awarded a Queen’s Anniversary Prize for providing imaginative educational programmes for adults, students, children and the general public, thereby breathing new life into education for people of all ages and enriching their lives.

Since 1986 he has been giving lectures to gardening clubs, horticultural societies, Art Societies, WIs, and many other types of group.  He has given more than 2,000 talks in Britain, Ireland, Germany, France, North America, and Australia to more than 150,000 people in audiences ranging from 20 to 350.

In 2010 he was elected as a Fellow of the Linnaean Society of London.

From August 2014 he has been a lecturer in Plant Sciences at Somerville College, Oxford, and holds similar positions at Pembroke College and Hertford College.

The evening will include a plant sale of both common,  rare and unusual plants grown by Surrey Group Members, a raffle and the opportunity to enter the 'Flower of the Meeting Competition'. 

Doors open 7:00pm talk starts 7:30pm

Refreshments will be available.

If you are unable to join us physically in Cobham but would like to join us this talk will be given via Zoom.  An invitation will be sent out to all Surrey Group Members for whom we hold an email address a few days before the talk.  If you are not a Surrey Group Member, but would like to join us for the talk, it is available for free to all Plant Heritage members and a suggested donation of £5 to the Surrey Group for non-members. 

If you would like to join us via Zoom or would like some further information please contact us at surreyph@gmail.com