Monday, October 30, 2006

Pottin up begins


I have started to pot up the hyacinths and paperwhite narcissi that will be on sale for Christmas - the idea is to have seemless waves of flowers, though that involves a lot of moving the pots between the tunnel and the house to bring them on or hold them back.
I have chosen 2 main themes - blue and white with aged aluminium/zinc and to be really Christmassey bold red and green. The two bowls that I have planted up with paperwhites are in their everyday life jolly mixing bowls. I like things to have a use after the bulbs are finished.
The lue and white planters have an easy on the eye antique look and are the planters that I hae chosen for my spring bulb range which I will hopefully be selling at Partick Farmers Market in January, February and March. Imagine them filled withwhite scented snowbunting crocus or nodding snakeshead fritillaries. Watch this space.
Hank pointed out to me that I had restricted comments on this site to other blogger users - sorry, it was not deliberate and I have now changed the settings - please comment away!

4 comments:

Primrose Hill said...

Hi Jane,
Your pots look fab, love the colours and the idea of being able to use the pots/bowls once the bulbs are finished flowering - very nice!
Can't believe you had a blowout on the dual carriageway, what next! Good job there are still some nice blokes out there willing to give us ditsy's a hand!

Anonymous said...

Jane,
Have been dropping by regularly and I'm delighted to see that you've changed the comment format to allow us non Bloggers have a say!

Anonymous said...

I love what you are doing.

But, uh, did you know that forcing Hyacinths essentially kills them?

Obviously these are your plants and you can do what you want, Further, I know that this is a business so you need to do what must. Plus, killing a a hyacinth is not the end of the world - like eating an onion right? I mention this only to see if you knew. As a general rule I only force things from the Narcissus family as they can handle it and come back.

Anyway, please don't misinterpret this post: YOU ARE DOING GREAT THINGS and I love swinging by and checking this space.

Have a great day!

Hank

Jane said...

Hi Hank - I have actually had great results from replanting forced hyacinths - I put all my leftovers in my parents garden and they are gradually colonising an area under a cherry tree. It is not at all the sort of area that you would think they would like, but is on almost pure sand so has great drainage and some spring sunshine before the tree leafs up.
I think that if you force them in water they will probably not reflower - as all the bulbs's nutrients go on growing - if you use general compost though that isn't an issue. As I understand it the pre-treatment they get is a chilling to kid the bulbs that they have been through winter.
The paperwhites won't reflower at all and I am fine about that!.