Some people talk plant, some want to be engineers, others to travel the world. What is clear is that this is a remarkable project in Radstock has grown into something utterly spectacular.

Within a modest set of greenhouses on the Withlington School site, literally thousands of orchids are being prepared to be sent out to the rest of the world to help protect landscapes from the volcanos of Rwanda and the slopes of the Andes.

The Orchid Project has become the largest of its kind in the UK, inspiring conservationists across the globe.

So Nub News went along to find out more:

Simon Pugh Jones MBE is the teacher lead of the Orchid Project and he told us what it is they do.

The passionate orchid ambassador introduced us to one of the rarest of the orchids in the greenhouses - Renathera imshcootiana - which is he explained is : " One of the most threatened endangered species in the world - an Appendix 1 - there are only a few hundred in the world. Our big motivation in the work we do is helping provide capacity for people to raise plants sustainably in their home environment. So supporting conservation by getting seeds back to this places.

"Conservation only works when you have growers. Scientists are great conservationists but if they cant GROW the plants they aren't any use. So we teach how orchids are grown - and that is what is so special. "

Simon started at Writhlington 1989 as a physics teacher and took over the old greenhouses. Having grown orchids himself when he was a teenager, he knew the dazzling potential of this sometimes-beautiful plant and so, excuse the pun, the seed was sown.

Students at both Writhlington and the Mendip School are now growing, cultivating and selling orchids. Within those classes there is also a special project team - who get involved in the conservation projects - one of whom joined when she was in Year 7, Zoe Parfitt.

During her time with the Orchid Project she went from being a shy hesitant pupil, terrified of being asked to speak in public, to being confident to travel - alone - to address orchid conferences across the world. After leaving school she trained at Bristol Botanical gardens and is now working as professional horticulturist .

She told Nub News : " My family were always outdoorsy and we did a lot of camping, and my mum was a keen gardener, so it was in my blood. But in year 7 I was one of the lonely kids that gets pushed on to Simon (laughs) and I still remember that first day walking into the green houses and being terrified. "

There are now 240 square metres of orchid heaven at Writhlington - with a thousand species of orchid, from the sublimely fragile to the rudely spectacular.

Zoe is still helping out at the project and was last abroad mentoring a new group of youngsters when they visited a conservation project in Botswana.

She told Nub News: " I am not sure what is next for me, I have RHS level 3 diploma, I like a lot of areas of horticulture so all I know is that I want to work with plants. "

But the Orchid Project is not just for the green fingered students - because of the sophistication of the work there, students can be inspired to help with engineering the systems, setting up growing areas, developing the sales side, or simply being inspired, once Covid is over, to travel.

You can see some of the student teams who have been involved over the years by clicking HERE

the Writhlington project

Not all students ' talk plant ' as the team call it, as in being interested in horticulture. A previous student in the team went on to work with the airline

British Airways. Simon said : " It was the travel got him. People spread out and do all sorts of things. "

Later this week pupils will be showing the In Bloom judges around the orchids.

Dr Pugh Jones said: " The judges will be able to see the fantastic impact of plants on young people. We already have 13 RHS gold medals, so for us the positive is to be able show those kids who have just joined the school being able to talk about these plants, which is just as important as being able to re-pot them.

" We get pupils involved here from when they are young, because you don't have any distractions, and it gets into your blood, " explains Simon.

" What happens is that when students join the project they become attached to one group of plants and they become experts in that group. They find out where the orchids originate from, what pollinates them, where they will come under attack so the threats. When it comes to understanding plants and the place of plants in the world those are really important things. So that is a window in.

"They learn growing orchids from seeds in our lab in Mendip School, those techniques are a fantastic resource for people in the tropical world, who are very keen on conservation and for the development of that science. So we work helping to set up projects in schools, particularly at the moment in Rwanda and a new project underway in Peru. "

The Orchid Project grows more orchids from seed than anyone else in the UK, with sales making the funding for the conservation trips. You can buy plants from the project by clicking HERE : The Orchid Project shop

Simon told Nub News: " Orchids may be thought of as fragile, but anything that has evolved for living up a tree has to be pretty tough really. There are some little things that are in constant mist and fog which are delicate but we grow all types of orchid, in five different climate zones. We replicate the natural conditions that the plants grow in, and there are micro habitats too some shady wall very different from high in the bright light."

So what is the worst thing you can do to an orchid?

" Let it get cold. The number one thing is to worry about the temperature, the other thing is watering, we water with rain water, and incorporate lots of air so ensure they are free draining.

"We don't use local tap water. That is because of the danger of salt build up because our local water is so full of dissolved calcium, that will kill the root tips. "

The tropical mountain sector is kept at 7 degrees for the best for those kind of orchids as Simon explains: " That is where there is the biggest concentration of rare plants, not the Amazon basin which is relatively poor in terms of species numbers. It is the mountains of the Andes on the Amazon side ; that's where our hearts are."

There are 25,000 species of orchid worldwide, ranging from terrestrials like UK native species growing in the ground (like ones on the Writhlington rugby field), but the majority of orchid species grow in trees.

For now coronavirus has put paid to all open days and student travel, something Simon is very sad about. He told Nub News : " We are very keen to get back to travel, the way that the developed world is not properly supporting vaccination in poorer parts of the world, is so sad.

" We are one planet - it is for us - all of us. We are uniquely able to take back plants - hundreds of thousands of them - to places across the globe, we often have plants here which people in that country can no longer find, its all part of the big effort to work as a world together in terms of our biodiversity. "

So if you contact them and would like to start with an orchid ?

"If you contact us we will offer usually something you have not seen before, we have a thousand orchid species. And we are now listed as one of the Top 31 intuitional orchid projects on the planet, now included in the book World Orchid Collections 2020. We have an orchid for everyone."

As Simon talks to us he is labelling some of the orchids being posted out for sale - the names a veritable Scrabble of letters ... Micropera rostrata, Platystele stenostchya, Schomburgkia lueddemanii ... But even this orchid expert admits that he doesn't recognise everything in the green house.

" Better wait until that one flowers, " he tells Zoe, who shows him a plant. " We may need to wait until it flowers so we know exactly what it is. "