when being interviewed, was asked (in what Ferdinand called "obviously a light-hearted conversation") if he was involved. Although Ferdinand said he had no knowledge of the events, as the discussion continued he eventually joked that he had "helped (them) over the wall"; the next day, he was approached by a tabloid journalist bearing pictures of a sobbing Thrower, telling Ferdinand they were intending to put his "confession" on the front page. Percy Thrower's work for the BBC was not restricted to gardening. In the 1960s, Thrower, a habitual pipe smoker, was asked by the radio producer Tony Shryane to provide sound effects for The Archers. He gave up smoking after a heart attack in 1985. In 1963, he built his own house, "The Magnolias", near Shrewsbury, on land he acquired with a friend in the small village of Merrington, north west of Shrewsbury. This gave him a garden of about one and a half acres to "play with", something which he had never had before. The garden subsequently became the location for some of the episodes of Gardeners' World. He opened the garden to the public in 1966, and this became an annual event to raise money for charity. The Magnolias was demolished in 2014 as a result of structural damage. In 1967, he became involved with the development of what was one of the first garden centres, Syon Park, near Brentford, Middlesex, owned by the Duke of Northumberland and backed by Plant Protection, a division of ICI, who had leased from the Duke. The centre was a success at first, but then sales tailed off and Thrower left the project. In 1970, in partnership with Duncan Murphy, he bought the firm of Murrell's of Shrewsbury and turned it into the Percy Thrower Garden Centre. He retired in 1974 from the post of Superintendent of Parks as Shrewsbury and started a weekly column for the Daily Mail in 1975. He also wrote for several other papers, notably the Daily Express and the Sunday Express. He wrote for the magazine Amateur Gardening and also wrote many books, which were published by Collingbridge and later Hamlyn. The BBC dropped Thrower in 1975 when he agreed a contract with Plant Protection, for a series of commercials on independent television. He did this in the full knowledge of what the repercussions would be with the BBC, and later said it was the best contract