With live musicians, art in the gardens and delicious home-made food at the Village Hall. This year’s much-loved community event will be held on Saturday 15th June from 11am to 5pm. A variety of Gargrave’s garden gems will be on show, alongside live music and art in gardens and other venues throughout the beautiful Yorkshire Dales…
Saffron is the most expensive spice in the world and comes from the three long deep red stigmas of the autumn flowering Crocus sativus. Saffron is grown commercially for food colouring and flavouring. It flowers in October and November with large lilac flowers with distinctive purple veins. Plant the bulbs in August or September…
Salvias are commonly referred to as sage, including Salvia officinalis (common sage) which is widely used in cooking. Salvias really earn their keep in the garden with a great range of colour and form which makes them indispensable border plants. Their are long lasting and attract butterflies and pollinators, which is always good for the…
If you are looking for bold and dramatic this is the plant for you. Dahlia are a genus of bushy, tuberous, herbaceous perennial plants native to Mexico. There is a diverse choice of dazzling colours and a range of stunning form, from single to pompom to cactus to ball and many more. Dahlias are one…
The story ‘Oggie’ our very own Robot Composter There is great excitement at Kershaws at the moment, as we prepare to take ‘Oggie’ our composting creation on an outing – to the RHS Chelsea Flower Show 2018. ‘Oggie’ is our entry for an inter Garden Centre competition… And we would like you to meet him……
What a glorious day it was today. Whilst helping a customer to choose a waterlily, out of the corner of my eye I thought I saw a fairy dancing in the breeze… As I turned to check I saw that I was being deceived by Lychnis flos-cuculi otherwise known as Ragged Robin or flower of…
For the last few weeks I have been watching the buds swell on the Rhododendrons and waited in eager anticipation for their eye-catching flowers to open with wine-red, delicate pink, deep purple or snow white blooms that are a colourful addition to any flowerbed. The first to open was Dwarf Rhododendron Cilpinense with its large,…
A few weeks ago whilst we were still in grip of winter I photographed the furry buds of Magnolia, did you know that they have three furry layers to protect their flowers through winter? Magnolias are one of our most primitive flowering trees with fossilised specimens dating back over 20 million years. They are named…
Tiarellas are commonly known as foam flowers due to their frothy blooms. Tiarella cordifolia ‘Spring Symphony’ is my favourite, producing a mass of elegant, dainty slightly fragrant flower spikes of white stars that open below a tight, apple-blossom-pink poker of buds. These flowers bring light to any shady spot. The froth of flowers seems to…
A member of the heather family Pieris originated from the forested mountain regions of China, Japan and Taiwan, often called ‘Lily-of-the-Valley’ shrub. Pieris are an evergreen, easy to grow, showy spring shrub, which put on a spectacular display of white or pink bell-shaped flowers and colourful new growth which ranges from pale pink to dark…