Warm and hairy

Morning all, 

Much warmer this week and for next week too, but now very wet indeed down here. We are back to similar conditions to those before the mini Beast from the East arrived, the track-ways that are usually so firm are spongy underfoot where the water just can't get through the subsoil fast enough despite being on 'free-draining' chalk. Luckily we haven't had too much arrive as downpours, so no flooding events so far, touch wood. The winters trench/drain digging and installation is paying dividends at the moment, I haven't seen any beds flood yet which has always been a worry in previous winters.

Naturally, you cure one issue and another raises its ugly head, or in this case pretty head. Despite the nursery being rabbit fenced we seem to have enclosed our own thriving population and they are causing havoc with their grazing of our stock. They definitely have their favourites, it's been purple sage this week, it was Liriope the week before and green fennel before that. The cats used to keep on top of the situation, but I think we are going to have to introduce some new blood to get on top of this. As soon as it warms up a touch and everything comes into full growth, the stock will mostly grow back nicely, having had a tidy trim, and the rabbits will have too much choice elsewhere to be quite such a worry, but just at the moment everywhere we turn there is another patch stripped.

We've had the electricians in again for most of the week, sorting out stuff, installing some extra fans in the new loo block to avoid having to have the double glazed windows open all winter (let's have some joined up thinking please!) refitting trips and switches in the irrigation shed to stop the tripping of the system when both pumps come on, fitting individual isolator switches, with an indicator light, on each of the 16 new despatch heaters, so we can tell when they are on and isolate them to 'off' if unused for any long period. We also replaced a very old consumer unit, originally installed before we even started the nursery 37 years ago. Not a lot to show at the end of the day, but I'm feeling warm about it on the inside.

NBIS zoom meeting last week, which was brilliant. It's mainly a therapy session for stressed out nursery folk and it works a treat. We don't see many people at the best of times, but over the last year I've probably only been off-site a dozen times, I've still got most of the same small wad of notes in my pocket that I had last March, so to see a group of familiar faces for a catch up was really refreshing. There was a lot of scary stuff to share, the ongoing changes to plant passporting and Xylella controls, to the nightmare that is the importing and exporting fiasco going on over our borders. Tales of stock being held for many days awaiting clearance, with no indication as to how long it will be before it is released, due to the thousands of other containers waiting ahead in the queue. The tales of mammoth preparations being made before January that where of no use at all when it actually came down to getting the goods moved, and the ongoing challenges that were presenting themselves literally as each hour passes. Different inspectors are interpreting rules in different ways and authorities in different countries can't agree on what is required. It sounds like a nightmare. Things are so difficult to get into the UK now, that a lot of EU suppliers are just giving up on even trying to sort it out. I'm not sure these issues are going to get much better for a while yet and when you add in the covid complications to the mix, there could well be a fair amount of disruption to supply chains for us all. We have tried to be really organised and prepared, by placing orders for our stock many months in advance of when we need it, but we are still not sure if they will get here. There are shortages of containers to hire for shipping, along with the disruption to production of stuff due to the virus. It is going to be a very challenging year again, but at least the virus should be on the back foot and we might get back to some dancing later in the year!

Availability list highlights

Spring time is just round the corner and quite a few of the early spring bulbs are thrusting forth. We have lovely colour on some of the Scilla mit. and the Snowdrops (Galanthus) so don't miss out. Only a few left.

Our Fritillaria (snakes head lily) are looking green and chunky with more and more bud being produced already. Some of our short Narcissus varieties are now in bud, short and stocky and full of spring promise. We still have some great Helleborous niger and orientalis on the nursery.

The long flowering little Cyclamen coum are available now. They are showing great colour and will flower all winter and well into the spring. Only available this year in a mixed colour range. We have a nice range of the evergreen Bergenia's in stock all propagated in our microprop lab, I can see the centre buds swelling ready to produce flower stems, so it won't be long before they do their thing.

Pulmonaria's are budding up now with some colour showing on the Blue Ensign and lovely tight bold foliage on the other two. I have two Scabiosa in bud, looking strong, and in the mild temperatures last week there was even the odd opening flower. I suspect with the eastern blast will have dented that rash gesture, but it just shows how close we are to some serious flowering activity. This early in the year their blue colouring definitely has a rosy hue, but colour is colour! 

Take care out there, from all at Kirton Farm Nurseries