The Patient Gardener: Worcestershire's prize blogger

Helen Johnstone: the face behind the award-winning gardening blog.

When Helen Johnstone couldn't get out into her real garden, she started writing about it on her blog, The Patient Gardener:

"I started it because the weather was so awful and I needed my fix."

Three years later, Helen's now a regular guest on BBC Hereford & Worcester's Sunday Gardening Show with Mike George and Reg Moule.

She's also been named as the Blotanical Best Urban Garden Blog in 2009 and Blotanical's UK Garden Blog in 2008.

Helen, who works in administration and lives with her family in Malvern, doesn't consider herself an expert gardener:

"I want to reach out to amateurs - to start with I kept it very focussed, but as time goes on you get to know your readers more."

Social networking

She blogs two or three times a week and says the online world of garden blogging is definitely growing:

Among others, garden bloggers meet up at Malvern's Spring Gardening Show.

"Every day people are joining from all over the world - there's definitely a network there and we regularly meet up at various (regular) events like the Chelsea Flower Show and Malvern Spring Gardening Show."

As well as being a hobby, Helen says it's very therapeutic to write about her garden and new allotment, which she's been planning throughout January:

"It becomes something to help you sort your thoughts out - it's a bit like a twenty first century diary really."

You can next hear Helen on The Sunday Gardening Show on 6 February live on BBC Hereford & Worcester or on the BBC iPlayer.