IT’S trowels at the ready as a green-fingered Swindon scientist is set to appear on a national gardening programme.

Rob Dawson, who works at the North Star Avenue based-Research Councils, will feature in BBC 2’s The Great Chelsea Garden Challenge, which celebrates the best of British amateur gardening talent.

The competition, airing from May 11, sees Rob face off against five fellow floral enthusiasts, constructing four gardens to win the ultimate plant prize – the chance to design and build a garden for the Oscars of the gardening world, The Chelsea Flower Show.

Rob hopes to weed out the competition with one unlucky gardener eliminated each day.

The 35-year-old was selected to appear on the national programme after submitting a garden design incorporating spaces for exercise and sunbathing.

“To design a garden at that level, you just think there’s no way I’m going to be able to do this. It was unbelievable to be picked and I was shocked,” he said.

Rob’s passion for gardening flourished during his degree in biology where he studied a botany component.

He said: “As a scientist I get to see the scientific side of plants and flowers and I know which ones work together and what they need to flourish.

“I’ve also been gardening for a long time and enjoy visiting gardens and seeing the different planting combinations.

“But actually being able to design one, let alone four in just a few days is a completely different skill-set. I was so nervous.”

Going from laboratory to lawn was an easy transition for Rob who cultivated his skills designing two gardens for his Southwick home.

And part-time actor and producer Rob certainly had the h-edge over his clipping competitors.

“I’ve done set design before and that gave me the idea of the scale of things but to go through the whole process was unbelievable. It was so much fun and I’ve really learnt a lot.”

Rob’s beloved grandmother also inspired him to jump from science to soil.

“My grandmother loved gardening and when she passed away three years ago it made me think about how I could make a garden safer,” he said.

Rob confessed to nerves at being observed by an esteemed panel of judges including the Royal Horticultural society’s James Alexander Sinclair, gold medal-winning garden designer Ann-Marie Powell and Gardeners World favourite and mentor, Joe Swift.

“I was pretty nervous, you do forget the cameras are there when you’re getting stuck into your garden. There’ll be lots of footage of me running about because we had a lot to get done in such a short space of time,” he said.

“We had days to design and build the gardens, usually people get months to do something like this.

“It was amazing how stuck in everybody got- I even got covered in purple paint at one point- and it shows that anything can and does happen in the world of gardening.”