Plants Online

A few tips to get you through the Summer, if it happens to be a wet or a warm one!

Remember, your garden may need care while you go on holidays, we have tips to help you ensure your planters and baskets make it through the holidays.

Growth levels are at a maximum during the next few months, especially if we have rain inbetween the warm weather. Pruning may need to happen to keep your hedges and plants in check.

The summer months are the most beautiful months in the garden. Growth is rapid which means your planters and hanging baskets need regularly dead heading.

By doing this you will encorage the plants to keep producing new shoots and flowers.

Water potted plants during dry spells. By covering the top of the pot with mulch you will help to keep the moisture in. 

Fruit and vegetables especially need regular water to keep them growing at a steady pace. Especially mind the high water content fruit like tomatoes, too little or irregular watering can cause them to split.

Remember the fruit trees planted in the soil, they may need water too...

While you're on holidays it's all about the water. 

Minimize damage by arranging a friend to water regularly for you.

Using water storage crystals in your baskets, tubs, containers and window boxes means less watering throughout the season.

In Ireland we are quite lucky to have enough rain, even during the Summer. This means however, the growth rate of plants can only be discribed as phenomenal.

Dead heading your bedding and herbaceous plants throughout the Summer will encorage thick lushes growth.

You may also find though that you may need to prune some of the more vigorous shrubs or hedging back in the middle of the season.

If you need to do this, be gentle, just prune to keep the plant in check, the more extensive pruning can be done after the season.

Get Inspiration!

Visiting your local historic park or garden can give you loads of inspiation and motivation to create an amazing garden at home.

Ireland has only one garden show a year (Bloom in the Park), which is well worth a visit. Being an island, we are the last to hear about the latest gardening phase, or which plant is in fashion.

We have however a stunning selection of gardens all over the country boasting a huge amount of horticultural know-how. From the the far north west of Donegal and the stunning views of the Glenveagh National park to our own botanical gardens and small domestic gardens opening just one day a year, Ireland has a lot to offer.

Anyone who enjoys the amazing simple beauty of an opening poppy flower or the rough bark of a pine tree will find something in the differing styles the islands gardens have to offer.

Visiting a garden at this time of year helps to motivate us again after the long winter and often gives us little nuggets of ideas we can use at home to transform our own back gardens.

Mount Usher gardens is one of my favourite. Working there as a student gave me a huge  understanding of the Robinsonian style of gardening.

Powerscout gardens in Enniskerry has a more formal style using the landscapes natural undulations to create a stunning park land.

Our small parks inside Dublin city, St.Stephen Green for example, provide the much needed breathing room for our city dwellers. In the sunshine its many green areas are filled with with happy peolpe enjoying the open spaces.

Our National Botanical Gardens offers something special to eveyone, novice or professional gardener.

Make this one thing you do this year, wether you take the whole family and enjoy a picnic, or take your favourite book and savour the silence, go and see can ireland's gardens inspire you!

Summer bedding = Sumer colour!

Bedding plants are either once-flowering annual plants which are sown, grow and flower all in the same year, or biannual plants which are sown and grow in the first year and flower in the second year.

Bedding plants can be used in traditional flower beds, or as fillers and in pots and containers. The most amazing colour combinations can be created with monocrome or mixed colour displays.

The secret is to water and feed your bedding regularly through the summer months, from May to October they will provide you with exuberent colours!

As bedding plants are grown for one season only, they need to grow quickly and the soil in their permanent planting position must be well fed and moist. Plants should be inserted firmly at about 30 cm apart and watered well after planting.

Top tips for perfect blooms:

Sun or Shade – for most plants the ideal is at least a partly sunny position, and avoid strong winds.  

Watering – choose a compost to which water retaining granules have been added. A basket in full flower will typically require at least once a day in dry weather.  

Feeding - feed your baskets regularly. It is recommended to feed them about once a week, to produce baskets full of colour.  

Colour – in general it’s best not to use more than three distinct colours. A very successful basket can be made by using variations of a single colour theme. While it is not as common, a basket planted with a single variety can be very effective. (See Petunia basket picture below)

Foliage – the importance of foliage plants to a basket is often overlooked. They contribute to overall structure and balance, provide colour when there is a lull in flowering, and can be used to complement flower colour.

Dead-heading – Removal of dead flowers and  leaves once a week will lenghten the flowering period.

Experiment with different colours and plants, there are so many varieties of bedding available you can try out differnt displays every year!

Making your own compost

This is not only good for your garden, it also cuts down on your kitchen food waste. Compost is usually made in a compost bin. But you can make your own using old pallets or chicken wire. Remember that compost bins work better if they are set directly onto the soil, this means the worms can get access to the fresh garden waste and start breaking it down. 

Remember to seperate your grass clippings and leaves from your garden and kitchen waste. Ideally, if you have the space make seperate areas for them to break down.

Tips to getting lovely rich dark garden compost :

-Add a variety of waste, from kitchen peelings, garden clippings, even small twigs to encorage air circulation.

-Cardboard and paper can also be added.The secret is adding roughly the same amount of everything!

-Mix your compost regularly, if you have the space, build two pallet compost boxes side by side, this will allow you to shovel compost from one to the other.

-If your feeling that your compost isn't developing as quickly as you would like, you can add a liquid compost maker. This will speed up the process.

Do compost:                                                      Don't compost:

-Grass mowing, though not in bulk                        -Cooked food

-Weeds (not weeds with seed heads)                   -Meat & fish scraps

-Fruit & vegetable scraps                                   -Used cat litter

-Tea bags & coffee ground                                 -Coal & ash remains

-Old flower & bedding plants                               -Disposable nappies

-Vegetable plant remains                                   -Potato peelings, as these will grow!

-Autumn leaves, though not in bulk

-Shredded woody prunnings

-Cardboard & egg boxes

-Twigs & garden prunnings

Composting ingredients will shrink as they decay so you may be able to to continue adding material and removing it without the bin ever getting full.If it does fill up, just leave the materials in it to decay, and start another heap.

Malahide Rugby Club

It is sometimes hard to tackle large areas of ground, especially when people use these areas every day. Malahide rugby club(http://malahiderfc.ie/)wants to revitalise the grounds and the planting areas in keeping with the building and the people which visit the club. Also in use as a creche and function room facility, they were unsure where to start so they contacted us and we got involved

Before

Since the club is a vital facility in our local community we have began supporting them by drawing up a landscape plan and began carrying out work using a team of landscapers.

We have sponsored the work to date and are planning to continue the work to keep club landscape in order.

We started by spraying all the hard surfaces to keep the weeds down in the paths this is crutial at this time of year as weeds can get out of control in a matter of weeks,

Next was the large bed which spans the length of the front of the impressive building,The plants in the bed had either become unmanageable or had died,We relocated plants that were still usable and cleared the bed and prepared it for planting.

The existing Taxus bacatta (Yew) hedging was cut back down to shape which will provide evergreen structure to the bed when planting is completed.

Later in the project we plan to have a number of timber planters to provide colour and interest on the walkway to the entrance.

After

The plants will be replaced and we are hoping that local council, businesses and community groups that use the facility will sponsor some of the plants,We will then step in again and place the plants out in the correct manner and provide planting in the bed.

This is a large project which we are delighted to get involved and help our community with,as with all projects planning is vital.Take the time to plan in your garden and stick to the plan of works.It will make the project more manageable...Rome was'nt built in a day.

To get involved or to help us with plant sponsorship simply get in touch with us

The sunshine may be here but cold nights are still unavoidable!

A large selection of summer bedding is already on the shelves of the garden centres, DIY stores and super markets.

Those of you desperatly wanting to get into the summer mood by planting up your hanging baskets, window boxes and patio pots, please remember a cold night will severly damage these very tender plants.

In a way it is best to plant them now, to give them time to fill out and mature before you hang them out, just please remember to put them indoors overnight as they will not tolerate cold night temperatures.

Traditionally summer bedding was officially 'safe' after the May bank holiday weekend.This is a good rule of thumb and we don't have long to wait!

Another tip is not to do all your pots and baskets in one go, simply because the closer we get into the warm weather more and more differnt and interesting varieties of bedding will become available.

Enjoy mixing and matching your flowers together...with lots of colour you can never really go wrong!

An afternoon can change a lot!

This front garden was designed and landscaped by Tony approx. two years ago. A simple layout and easy to maintain space creating a garden which has interest all year round.

After a rough cold winter the garden needed and injection of colour and fresh plants.

A single upright tree, (Silver Birch) creates height in the garden while the 3 upright railway sleepers create a focal point. The green lawn attracts attention to the white stem of the birch and the flowers which stand out against the dark barkmulch.

Before

All that was needed was a few seasonal plants for colour, the lawn needed edging and the bark mulch topped up. Plants and bark mulch costing a total €130.00 was added to the garden, showing that with the smallest budget you can brighten and re-invigorate a small space.

An afternoon and a spade and some elbow grease will get you a quick result.

After

Edging your lawn and adding fresh bark mulch immediatly gives defination to an existing bed.

Simply send us pictures of your garden space and we will advise you which plants will brighten up your outdooor space, remember in the garden pictured above only  €130.00 worth of plants and barkmulch was added.

Flowers and pollination

April is the first month when alot of plants, edible fruits and ornamental plants are coming into flower.

For fruits to form, however, pollination must first take place.

We will take the confusion out of this process!

There are 3 types of fertility with plants...

Self-fertile- Will produce fruit without the need of pollen from another tree. You can plant this in the middle of nowhere and it will still produce fruit.

Partially Self-Fertile- Will produce some fruit without the pollen of another tree but more fruit is provided with a pollination partner e.g. another tree of the same species within a few miles.

Non-Self-Fertile- Needs a pollination partner to produce fruit i.e. another tree of the same species within a few miles.

Pollination is the process of pollen coming from a same species tree being physically added to the flowers of your tree to start the fruit growing process. This comes about by the generous nature of bees, moths, butterflies, flies and also the wind.

The wind however can also hinder the pollination process.For pollination to take place, the trees or plants in question need to flower at the same time.If when they come into flower its very windy and showery, it will be much harder for the pollen to be spread.

Remember, to figure out plants of the same species, look at the latin name, e.g. Malus is the latin name for the apple species, this covers both ornamental and edible varieties.

Another good example is the Prunus species, this covers Cherrys, Damsons, Plums, and Gages, as long as these flower at the same time they will pollinate each other.

As with everything there is an exception to the rule!

This exception is called a triploid!...this simply means that the plant needs two partners to be pollinated by not just one, an example is the Apple variety 'Bramley', so put simply, if you want bramley apples, you needs to plant three apple trees.

Don't let the sceince of pollination put you off growing fruit.

Try out varieties you like to eat, remember to keep the name tags of the plants you grow so you know what kind of pollination they need!

Spring is well and truly here!

There are a number of shrubs that flower on their bare stems.

One of the most stunning plants at the moment is the Forsythia.

It has just opened its yellow buds with highly scented flowers.

Forsythia, because they flower on their bare stems need to be prunned after it has flowered.

Forsythia will add a huge blast of colour at this time of year.

Remember, this is a large shrub so choose it's position in your garden carefully.

Forsythia thrive best in a well drained sunny spot, will however also tolerate a dappled position.

There are so many stunning looking shrubs which are now coming into flower.

Ribes is a shrub which is commonly known as the ornamental currant, if you crush the flowers or leaves you will smell that beautiful highly scented deciduous shrub.

Again remember to prune this shrub after flowering so that you have flowers on it next year.

This shrub can easily be grown by taking cuttings, simply cut 30cm lengths and firmly press into the soil.

This is a great plant to cut and bring indoors over esater, the scent will be  dilightful!

The flowering cherry is always the first sign that spring is surely here!

The magnolia with it's large fleshy flowers makes a huge statement in any garden,remeber they flourish best in an acidic soil.

Easter, the perfect time to start your gardening year.

With a bit of luck the weather will allow us to spend some time in the fresh air and maybe even organise an easter egg hunt!

All your spring bulbs will just be popping up now,daffodils are in full bloom and the others will soon show their true colours.

Kids love picking flowers, and of course if you have a big patch of flowering daffodils you can let them pick big overflowing bunches.

  It is important however, that bulbs flower and then are let to die back naturally, otherwise they lose strength for next years flowering.

Pests in the garden!

Once the cold weather is gone the kids won't be the only who re-discover the garden!

In the warm wet month of April slugs will multiply by the millions! Keeping on top of them now will pay off through the year. The safest way to remove them, in an environmental way is to build beer traps. Simply sink old jam jars into the soil in your beds, fill with a little beer, a cm should do! The slugs are attracted to this and will fall in. Change these every few days, especially in the rainy weather!

The other pest which will now start to become a large problem is the rabbit. As young shoots emerge they may quickly be nibbled off by young rabbits. The quickest way of controlling them is to let the dog chase them away! If you don't have one, simply plant rabbit resistant plants, such as Berberis. 

Happy Gardening!