Presenter biographies: S to T

Gardeners' World presenter Joe Swift is an expert on gardening and garden design.

"I garden all day, designing, doing TV, or writing, then I get home and do more gardening. On the weekends, I try to persuade my wife and kids to help outdoors. They love gardening, but not quite as much as me!"

Joe used to garden with his grandparents and his mother. It was only when he left school and started working for a gardener that he decided to make it his career.

When he's not on his allotment or in the garden at Berryfields, Joe is out and about running his own design business.

Joe's been a regular presenter and designer on Gardeners' World, co-presenter on the RHS Chelsea Flower Show, Gardeners' World Live, Hampton Court, RHS Tatton Park Flower Show, Open Gardens, and a design judge on BBC's Gardener of the Year.

He's written a book, The Plant Room, and writes for the national press, websites and gives a lot of live talks about horticulture. Plus he has a famous dad - Clive Swift of Keeping up Appearances!

Ever since she was a little girl, Anne Swithinbank has been fascinated by plants. She now writes for weekly magazines and is a panellist on BBC Radio 4's Gardeners' Question Time.

"I can't remember a time when I wasn't interested in gardening. I even looked after the school greenhouse. I just wandered in one day and started caring for the cacti and geraniums. I think the lab technicians were delighted!"

One of Anne's teachers suggested that she apply for the diploma course at Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew. "I have a lot to thank her for," she says.

After school, most of her friends disappeared to university and college, but Anne went to work at the nursery of her local parks department, which she says was considered very odd at the time. She loved it and only left because a place was waiting for her at the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew.

Anne met her husband, John, while studying. They went to RHS Garden Wisley together, where they lived in a flat in the roof of the laboratory building at Wisley, with their dog, two cats and two parrots.

While she was at Wisley, Anne got her first chance to appear on TV in Gardeners' Calendar and has appeared on countless programmes since then.

These days, her work consists mainly of writing from home. She says: "I love working from home because I can easily slip outside to do some gardening - don't tell my editors." She's also gives gardening talks and demonstrations around the country.

Anne's favourite gardening interests are gardening with wildlife in mind (plants and animals), growing fruit, vegetables, scented plants and indoor plants because they cheer her up in winter and give her something to do when the soil is wet and unworkable.

Her favourite part of the garden at the moment is the compost heap, which after an initial struggle is working really well and producing masses of well-rotted compost for her kitchen garden.

Ex-model Rachel de Thame appears occasionally on Gardeners' World.A career in modelling was not Rachel's ideal long-term choice, so she enrolled at the English Gardening School, where she earned a certificate in practical horticulture and plants and plantsmanship.

When asked how she manages to keep her fingernails so clean and long. Rachel replied: "I get a lot of flack from people who say you can't be a real gardener and try and grow your nails. But I wear gloves when I'm doing serious gardening to protect my hands from toxoplasmosis, which is an organism born in the soil that comes primarily from cats faeces and it can be very dangerous for pregnant women. Because I wear gloves, my nails don't get damaged."

As to her favourite plant, her biggest gardening inspiration and her favourite garden, she says: "The rose is my favourite. An obvious choice, but it has to be the rose. It's just so beautiful, its appearance, its scent, performing on and off from summer to Christmas. I know they're out of favour with garden designers, but I love them, the old and new varieties.

"My favourite garden has to be the Chelsea Physic Garden. It's close to me and where I studied. An ancient garden, it was founded in 1673 and is still in the same site by the River Thames. It is a place to learn as well as sit and be. Whenever I go I find something new and get inspired."

Perhaps the best-known gardener in the UK, Alan Titchmarsh was the presenter of Gardeners' World from 1996 to 2002 and Ground Force from 1997 to 2002, as well as presenting three series of How to be a Gardener. More recently he has presented British Isles: A Natural History, and The Gardener's Year. Alan continues to present the BBC's coverage of the RHS Chelsea Flower show, which he has done since 1983.

When presenting an MBE to Alan for his services to horticulture and broadcasting, the Queen told Alan "You've given a lot of ladies a lot of pleasure." Alan jokes that he would like to have it inscribed on his tombstone!

He was brought up on the edge of Ilkley Moor, Yorkshire, and left school at 15 to become an apprentice gardener in his local nursery. He then continued his training at agricultural college and the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew.

From there he became a horticultural journalist and was deputy editor of Amateur Gardening magazine. He then turned to a freelance career in broadcasting and writing.

Alan writes regularly for BBC Gardeners' World magazine. He has written more than 40 gardening books, including How to be a Gardener, parts one and two, The Gardener's Year and four novels.

On radio and TV, Alan has fronted programmes as diverse as Points of View and Songs of Praise as well as the 20th Century Roadshow.

The Garden Writers' Guild has twice named Alan Garden Writer of the Year; and there's a waxwork model of him at Madame Tussauds!