Its been one of those weeks where you plan in your head whats going to happen but circumstances takes you down an entirely different route.  There was no doubt that it was going to be busy as an abundance of stunning new stock was due in. Suddenly we were down one team player and it was out off site to work for me with Anthony our resident garden designer. Now I have to own up to the fact that I just love it helping Anthony with his work and there are a couple of projects on the go and both were razing the existing garden and replanting with a fab new design and of course plants....

Now Anthony or (Tony) and I make a great team if I do say so myself. The initial stage of rip shit and bust and believe me, we can clear big spaces in a short time.  Both gardens were tired and over grown and have now been re modeled with a fresh new look and its so rewarding when the client comes home and goes... Oh !! Wow!!!  Anthony just txt the clients at the first job touching base, hoping that they were pleased with their new garden and a reminder to water in the new plants, just to have a txt back to say "absolutely and the neighbours are also impressed" and  that they were watering, right then with a glass of wine in their hand. See many tasks are acheived accompanied with a glass of wine,its just when I get to two or three that there appears to be the odd problem... or maybe just two... LOL

The team in the nursery have been busy as well and probably more but its Friday and the plants are all away mostly and we are all set for another weekend. There was some pretty cool stuff that came in this week like:

Verbena Fire Chief as its name suggests  fire engine red and startling to say the least, the guys have it displayed nicely against Euphorbia Silver Swan. If you atre thinking a christmas display in the garden, this would be a combination hard to beat.

Queensland Frangipani tree, Managed to get a few of these in and they are great established plants. Fragrant Fragipani like flowers on an evergreen trees is pretty hard to beat.

Actaea Black Negligee, Now this is a total newbie to me and I havent had time to read up much about in other than to say that it has as its name suggest black lacy foliage not that Im well aquainted with any kind of negligee. Its kind of like an astilbe but will have to do some more work on this one before I can rave more. I don't think that there is even any detail on the web as I think that they ran plain out of time.

Every evening that I come home, I have to go under our grape vine and I have been meaning to write  and remind everyone that its time to pinch them back. They are flowering at the moment and you let them have two sets of flower per stem and then pinch the growing tip back so that all the goodness goes into the flower and coming grapes and then you need to keep them pinched all season. Then you will get the biggest and fattest grapes. 

Its coming to the festive season dare i mention already and you will be thinking raspberries, I bring this up as many of the raspberry plants that we have in the nursery are coming up to fruit. If you have a hankering to grow your own and its easy then plant some of these... youll get to taste some as well ...

Feijoas Unique Harry couldnt help himself and bought a heap of these Great plants 19.99 now just 12.99 and ten or more for Ten dollars each so if you want a feijoa hedge then this is it. Unique is described as self fertile for those that may wonder about its need for a mate

Lavender time and this is the best time to plant.

  

I'm not so good on the common names but I do know that English lavender is my favourite type, I call it real Lavender and it's the kind that you can pick and dry. Now Lavender is fairly promiscuous and today there are many clones or cultivars that are available to tempt Lavender lovers. Back to the English kind which I believe to be of the Angustifolia species and there are either the normal tall ones or those that have nana attached to their name and are much smaller growing.

Another main class of lavenders is the stoechus kind and these have what I call rabbit ears appearing out the top. These ones flower heaps and heaps and are a very pretty and free flowering plant to have in the garden.

Right now we have quite a collection of English lavenders so if you have a hankering for this classic plant click to follow the link. There is even some of the Pacific Pink English Lavender in the garden centre at the moment.

Ive just about finished my second wine so its best that this comes to an end. If you are looking for roses then nows the time to come and see us.. They are looking just fabulous, I cant skite enough about then. If its berries or fruits then we will probably have that as well. If its a browse in the garden then come on out too as it worth a drive and then a potter around the plants hehe.

Mail order. Last week for mail order will be the week prior to the Christmas week and there will be no mail order again until the week of 20th of Jan 2014

 

Take care and have a great weekend.

Cheers

Make it a Wairere weekend where even GNOMES know that gardening's not a drag.