Happy New Year to everyone, and I hope you all had a lovely Christmas and New Year. Sorry for being so quiet, but there always seems a lot going on over the Winter months. We have loads of projects that we have to complete before we start the Show and Plant Fair season. Some of them I cannot give too much detail about, but others I can certainly reveal some elements of them. So What do we have going on at the moment:
As you would expect we are keeping a close eye on the Hostas over this period preparing them for their growth period in early spring. Everything seems to be going well, having to top several of the pots up and have been busy up-potting lots of them.
We have been carrying out loads of infrastructure work out at both sites, creating tables for the New Hostas in Spring at our Milverton site. Sorting out the entrances at our Clayhanger site, putting down geotextiles, and sorting paths. All of this is in preparation for hopefully a to make our lives a bit easier, but also allow for a few open days this year.
We have what we call “Project F” which is our proposed National Collection of Fragrant Hostas which will be displayed in raised beds within Willow enclosures at our Clayhanger site. Lots to do, all the collection plants have been registered, and are being grown on and divided as we speak.
Additionally at Clayhanger we have “Project W” which is the creation of a new larger Willow enclosure to expand on our existing Willows. We currently have 16 varieties with well over 700 plants growing well from last year. The new enclosure will hopefully be well over double this size.
At our Taunton site we are in the process of setting up “Project M”. This one is a very exciting project, which we are currently keeping under wraps and is quite advanced and associated with our Hostas and put us in a unique position going forward.
After all that we have an exciting season going forward for this year. We are attending several RHS shows and the prestigious Blenheim Palace Flower Show for the first time. So we have been very busy preparing for this year too. I should mention that we currently have seventeen hundred Blue Mouse Ears in stock, you can’t keep a good hosta down.
So it is only for me to wish you a Happy New Year again, and come along and see if we can’t have fun. Remember the Hosta is known as the friendship plant.