Gifts for Gardeners

gardeners gift set

We are constantly receiving emails of gift ideas for gardening lovers. Its not as easy as you think to find the ideal present for someone that loves their garden more than anything in the world. What I would suggest to people is to think outside of the box but not too far. Many garden centres and online stores sell wonderful gift packages for gardeners. Take here for example where you have pre-packaged gifts for gardeners that any gardener would love, cherish or use. I suppose they are the three main things you should always bear in mind. Will this person love cherish or use their gift. Does it relate to gardening and am I paying a reasonable price for it. Gnerally youy will find most gardening products are cheaper online anyway, even with delivery costs and most reputable garden centres will deliver your spade or garden gnome within 2 working days. I always think the trwel, flask and bag sets are a great gift. What gardener would not love something like that? 

A lot of garden Centres now place a lot of emphasis on their gift range and can offer you everything from hat boxes to crystals, figurines and glasswear. You are spoilt for choice really.

BBQ’s Sell Out in Major Stores

bbq

With the extreme hot weather this year, shops have seen BBQ sales rise like never before. Major stores accross the UK and local garden centres have underesimated BBQ sales following several summers of bad weather. One local garden centre owner commented ” Last year we sold 15 BBQ’s all year. This year we have sold 120 and have a back log of orders with a 2 week waiting list. We have never known a scamble like it for BBq’s in our region of the North East of England. The hot summer weather has caught us out”. There are however still some BBQ’s left online if you look and actually some fantastic prices on both gas and charcoal BBQ’s. This years best selling BBQ’s seem to be the larger stockier type of BBQ’s that will be perminently placed for years to come, but after the predicted heatwaves still on the horizon throughout July and August, people are just buying and cheap BBQ they can to make the most of the time outdoors and in their gardens.
We have had a search around and the best range of BBQ’s we can offer our readers are here. Enjoy your Indian Summer. We have waited long enough for it.

Artificial grass lawns are the new cheap craze

artificial grass

There has never been a more important time in the history of the world for environmental concern. The scale of damage to our environment from human-generated activities is at an all time high – so high in fact that it could be too late to rectify some issues. Now more than ever before people are aware of the damage caused by carbon dioxide emissions and pollution; they see the effects of climate change in their everyday lives from unusually high summer temperatures and hosepipe bans to horrendous floods caused by rising sea levels, strong storms and regular, unusually strong winds. All these have hit the UK in particular in recent years and the reality of the challenges we face has been brought home to us all. We have a serious responsibility to seek, find and implement courses of action in an attempt to halt the downward spiral of environmental damage and climate change.

So what can we do to help our environment? Well, the best place to start is at home – look at your garden and think about what you are perhaps already doing to damage the environment.

Ask yourself these 5 questions:

Do you have a lawn?
Do you use fertilizers and pesticides, weed killer etc?
How much watering does it take each year?
How often do you have to cut the grass?
Do you use a petrol-driven lawnmower?

If any one or more of these 5 points applies to you then you are in some way creating a negative effective upon the environment.
This is where using artificial grass can help.
Admittedly, artificial turf is produced in a factory that produces carbon emissions but our company is the only company that purchases carbon credits to offset the damage and, what’s more, the damage caused in producing products for natural grass is much greater.

There are key issues where artificial grass can benefit the environment. The arguments put forward are, at the very least, stimulating, possibly even concerning. Either way we hope to have made out a good case for how artificial grass can be an ally to both our generation and the next’s in the fight against global pollution.

Artificial grass gardens not only look amazing but they are now cost effective and simple to keep. Never again do you need to cut your lawn. Your garden now looks like a country house all year round and imagine never having to break a sweat cutting it or watering it ever again.

For cheap cost effective but stunning artificial grass you need look no further than the Internet at sites such as this which is renowned for it’s award winning grass. For more information and free delivery from a reputable UK site check here.

I chose this site for artificial grasss as they also offer all the simple installation tools and you will have award winning artificial turf in no time.

Grow Your Own

Grow your own

PlantforLife and the Horticultural Trades Association (HTA) have teamed up with celebrity plantsman, Chris Collins to champion the next phase of ‘grow your own’ gardening by educating people with simple tips on how easy it is to plant and grow fruit trees and berries in containers or a small space in the garden.

Your local Garden Centre should now be featuring heavily on grow your own tools, skills and passing on offers that will entice you into Growing your own vegetables. Grow your own is not a new craze, it is simply that growing your own has become far cheaper in recent years and is now cheaper than buying in any high street supermarket.
Make sure that you have the best tools to grow your own and make gardening easier by talking to your local garden centre and asking for their advice. Poplar Tree Garden Centre offer advice via email, telephone or in person in their store and you can buy many Grow your own items online which will give you everything you need to get gowing and thrive.

Cloggies

Zesty Lime Essential Cloggies are now even softer, with cushioned insole, these injection moulded clogs are great for ‘keeping by the back door’ and slipping on to pop into the garden.

What is the great thing about cloggies? You can wear them indoors or outdoors and treat them as slippers or everyday shoes.cloggies have become a cult craze with shops running outbid cloggies days after they are put on the shelves.

Cloggies offer style, comfort and trend whilst also being so soft and gentle in your feet that you don’t know that you even have cloggiesnkn your feet

It has been said that cloggies protect and support your insole,the heel of the foot and even your back.if you have comfortable spongey shoes in cloggies then your back will be protected from the everyday rigours of being on your feet all day

Cloggies are here to stay,and it’s just unfortunate that they are so hard to find due to demand. We have found a good range online at garden centre

Spring is here.Time to start gardening

Spring is probably the busiest season in the garden. Plants are waking up, mulch needs to be removed, winter clean-up has to be done, and all before you can start planting this year’s garden.

If you have large clumps of herbaceous perennials it’s a good time to divide and replant them, as this will increase their vigour and provide spare plants for your garden. Use two forks back to back to split the clumps and water generously after replanting.

Start the growing season off right by filling your gardens with cool season flowers and vegetables. Some of these plants are hardier than we are and can be planted outdoors even before the threat of frost is past. Others may need a bit of coddling to begin with, but cool spring weather is when they shine, so don’t miss out by waiting too long to plant them

You can get a great range if seeds or plants online at places such as here:
garden centre online

Happy spring gardening

Clearing debris From The Garden

DEAL WITH THE DEBRIS Waste material from the beds is gathered up and put on the compost heap rather than burned, as many of the stems are still home to insects that will crawl from the heap when they hatch. The beds are raked clean in readiness for spring mulching and to make way for the bulbs.

ROOT OUT THE WEEDS Weeds become visible with the clear-up, so take your time to winkle out buttercup, nettle and couch. Bindweed might be more of an issue, as it delves deep when established. Where it is getting a hold, dig out plants that might be affected, carefully fork out and burn the white roots, and replant anything displaced by the upheaval. There is plenty of time for plants to get their feet back in again before spring, but work in some goodness now to improve their opportunities for the year ahead.

GET MULCHING I like to leave mulching until the ground is a little warmer, but where bulbs are coming through it is timely to work in a 5cm layer of weed-free organic matter before they grow any more. Never mulch on weed-infested ground, as you will simply be creating a better environment for the weeds.

Greenhouse Preparation

february garden

General Jobs in the Garden

If you have finished all the major tasks, such as digging over, creating leafmould heaps etc you will not have a lot to do in February but if like most of us you are scrambling to keep up, this is your last chance before spring.

Double check the greenhouse, ensure the glass is firmly secured and replace any cracked panes etc. If you’ve not managed to give it a thorough clean, now is the time before it is pressed into service.

Check last year’s potato bed for any volunteers (left over small potatoes) and remove them to avoid passing on disease problems and blight.

You’re going to be using your pots and seed trays next, so this is a good opportunity to wash out and sterilise them so you seedlings will get off to the best possible start. If you havent got any then dont worry. They are very cheap. An unheated propogator will certainly help and for an extra £2 is worth every penny

This years potato bed will benefit from a good application of compost or rotted manure that can be forked in or rotovated in to get them away.

You can cover soil with dark plastic sheeting, fleece or cloches to warm it up for a couple of weeks before you start to sow and plant.

January Gardening

garden centre

In the gardening world, “spring fever” is that time of the year when gardeners flock to nurseries to buy flowers, shrubs, trees and more by the truckload, and launch into a planting frenzy.

In our area, spring fever generally shows up in late March, accelerates through April and finally begins to diminish as the heat of summer moves in around mid- to late May.

The question is, do you have to follow the masses and wait until March to purchase and plant your trees, shrubs and flowers? And the answer is: No.

A great deal of planting can be done in January and February. Hardy trees, shrubs and flowers are not bothered by winter cold, and, in fact, there are good reasons not to wait. If you are thinking about planting a shade tree or small flowering tree (notice the spring-flowering trees beginning to brighten our landscapes now), there is absolutely no reason to wait until April. You can even select spring-flowering trees in bloom at the nursery and plant them. If you shop now, the staff at your local nursery will have time to answer questions about trees you are considering. At the minimum, never plant a tree without knowing how tall and wide it will be when mature.

One of the frustrations of the spring fever season comes when gardeners see incredibly beautiful beds of pansies, petunias, snapdragons, dianthus, alyssum and other cool-season bedding plants blooming lavishly. Wanting to duplicate the riot of color in their own gardens, many head out to the nurseries and purchase large numbers of these plants.

If you intend to have blooming delphiniums, hollyhocks or foxgloves in your spring garden, it is especially critical to plant them plant soon. Young, blooming plants planted in April or May are pathetic compared to those planted in late winter and especially January and February..

So, head out over the next few weeks to the nurseries in your area and purchase and plant hardy trees, shrubs, ground covers and cool-season bedding plants. When spring fever hits and the nurseries are swamped with customers, you can sit back, sip a glass of iced tea and admire all the planting you already have accomplished.

Autumn Raspberries

autumn raspberries

Raspberries are best grown from bare-root plants in the autumn. I have found that seed varieties are also extremely delicious. There are lots of different varieties available, which bear fruit at different times. The majority of raspberries are harvested between early and late summer, while others are grown for their autumn berries.

There are alternatives to autumn raspberries:
If growing summer varieties, drill holes into the posts and stretch three rows of galvanised wires (12 gauge) between them – these should be 76cm (36in), 106cm (42in) and 167cm (66in) above the ground and held in place by straining bolts, which can be tightened with a spanner. If you have an autumn variety, there’s no need to add the top wire.

Prune canes that held fruit in summer during the autumn, cutting them right back to the ground. Tie in about eight of the strongest new canes from each plant to fruit next year, and remove the rest. Prune autumn fruiting varieties in mid-winter, cutting the old canes back to ground level. Tie in new stems to the supporting wires as they grow, using garden twine

I will let you know how this years crop of autumn raspberries taste later in the year if anyone is interested.