• Continue to protect from frost.
• Water plants regularly.
• Keep on top of weeding and hoeing.
• Prune spring-flowering shrubs that have finished flowering.
• Provide support for tall herbaceous plants.
• Mulch your soil to help conserve moisture ORNAMENTAL BARK is ideal.(NB your soil must be moist before applying mulch)
• Watch out for pests and diseases and treat as necessary.

Greenhouse

• Ventilate the greenhouse well by
  day and water plants more frequently.
• Apply shading paint to the greenhouse.
• Damp down regularly.
• Continue to prick out and pot on seedlings
• Continue hardening off bedding plants.

Lawns

• - Feed established lawns if not done in April.LAWN BUILDER is excellent and
  does not require watering in after application, unless the weather is dry and
  the lawn is under stress.
• Remove Weeds.
• Mow lawns weekly.

Patios and Containers

• Plant up tubs , hanging baskets etc once
  the risk of frost has passed – in the
  middle of the month at the earliest.
• Check plants regularly to see if
  watering is necessary.
• Get the BBQ ready!

Indoors

• Continue to re-pot house plants if necessary.
• Water regularly.
• Begin feeding regularly.
• Watch for pests and diseases.

• Spring clean borders, keep on top of weeding and hoeing
• Feed roses, borders, hedges, trees, shrubs & spring bulbs with general purpose fertiliser e.g Growmore
• Finish soil preparation
• Continue Planting!
• Mulch beds with Bark Mulch to help suppress weeds and help retain moisture.
• Spray roses against black spot.
• Protect young growth from slugs and snails
• Buy a water butt to conserve water.
• SPRING IS HERE!!!

Green Houses

• Buy and pot up starter plants.
• Plant up summer hanging baskets.
• Begin to harden off plants.
• Ventilate on sunny days, but shut down mid afternoon to retain heat at night.

Lawns

• Treat moss and weeds
• Feed established lawns
• Reeseed bare patches, Lay turf.
• Mow regularly

Patios & Containers

• Plant Spring bedding and Summer bulbs in pots.
• Mix water retaining gel with compost to help retain moisture.
• Add slow release fertiliser
• Plant alpinr troughs.
• Bring in your hanging baskets for us to make up for you.

Indoors

• Re-pot house plants if necessary.
• Water regularly.
• Watch pests and diseases.

In stock NOW at the Garden Centre – prices range between £3.99 and £19.99

Hellebores are widely grown in gardens for decorative purposes. They are particularly valued by gardeners for their winter and early spring flowering period; the plants are surprisingly frost-resistant and many are evergreen. Many species of hellebore have green or greenish-purple flowers.

The so-called Christmas rose (H. niger), a traditional cottage garden favourite, bears its pure white flowers (which often age to pink) in the depths of winter; large-flowered cultivarsare available, as are pink-flowered and double-flowered selections.

The most popular hellebores for garden use, however, are undoubtedly H. orientalis and its colourful hybrids(H. × hybridus). They flower in early spring, around the period of lent, and are often known as Lenten hellebores, oriental hellebores, or Lenten roses. They are excellent for bringing early colour to shady herbaceous borders and areas between deciduous shrubs and under trees.

• Improve your soil with ORGANIC SOIL IMPROVER and mulch bare soil to seal in moisture and prevent weeds COMPOSTED BARK is ideal
• Treat emerging weeds on paths with PATHCLEAR. Sprinkle GROUND CLEAR round established trees and shrubs to prevent weeds.
• Prune roses, climbers and shrubs as required.
• Lift and divide overgrown clumps of perennials.
• Plant!
• Protect the soft growth of plants from spring frost damage -FLEECE is ideal.
• Begin a programme of slug and Pest Control.

Lawns

• Clear any remaining leaves and debris.
• Deal with worm casts and molehills.
• Make first cut – with blades set high.
• If grass is dry enough then begin regular mowing.
• Redefine lawn edges.
• Reseed bare patches of lawn.
• Lay Turf.

Patios & Containers

• Scrub or pressure wash patio slabs.
• Freshen up pots containing Winter/Spring bedding.
• Plant Spring bedding, flowering Spring bulbs, rock plants, compact perennials and small evergreens.
• Buy your garden furniture and BBQ!

Greenhouse

• Clean the greenhouse.
• Keep heating the greenhouse.
• Pot up starter plants.
• Lovely selection available now in the conservatory.
• Sow vegetable and flower seeds.

Indoors

• Water regularly now the weather is warming up.
• Re-pot houseplants if necessary.

Watch out for

• Slugs, snails, woodlice and greenfly under glass.
• On cold nights cover vulnerable plants with horticultural fleece and heat a frost – free greenhouse

General Gardening Tasks

• Make sure that the birds have food and water.
• Continue planting providing the ground is not frozen or waterlogged.
• Protect plants vulnerable to wind and rain.
•  Finish off winter digging.
• Prune winter flowering shrubs that have finished flowering.
• Prune summer flowering shrubs that flower on a new wood.
• Prune off old stems of herbaceous perennials.
• Prune roses.
• Take precautions to ensure your pond never freezes over entirely.

Watch Out For

• Early greenfly – but only take action if there’s a serious infestation – if outdoors it’s best left to the blue tits.

In stock NOW at Secretts Garden Centre from £14.99 each

Camellias are evergreen and small trees up to 20 meters tall. Their leaves are alternately arranged, simple, thick, serrated, and usually glossy.Their flowers are usually large and conspicuous, one to 12 cm in diameter, with five to nine petals in naturally occurring species of camellias. The colors of the flowers vary from white through pink colors to red; truly yellow flowers are found only in South China and North Vietnam. Camellia flowers throughout the genus are characterized by a dense bouquet of conspicuous yellow stamens, often contrasting with the petal colors^. The so-called “fruit” of camellia plants is a dry capsule, sometimes subdivided in up to five compartments, each compartment containing up to eight seeds.

The various species of camellia plants are generally well-adapted to acid soils, and most species do not grow well on chalky soil or other calcium -rich soils. Most species of camellias also require a large amount of water, either from natural rainfall or from irrigation, and the plants will not tolerate droughts.

Valentine Panna Cotta
½ litre double cream
1 vanilla pod
75g caster sugar
½sachet gelatine
3 tbsp hot milk

Halve the vanilla pod lengthways and scoop the seeds into the cream.

Add the sugar and heat until nearly boiling.

Line four heart shaped moulds with cling film.  If you can’t get the moulds use  a 7″  round cake tin.

Dissolve the gelatine in the hot milk and add to the cream.

Bring to the boil and pour into the moulds.

Tap the moulds gently on a table to level the surface and then chill overnight.

When ready to serve, gently turn out and remove the cling film.

Serve with fresh or frozen berries or a fruit coulis.

Call the Farm Shop on 01483 520500 for information regarding any of the ingredients in these recipes.

Our 3 girls spend their days at the moment keeping an eye out for the wild birds that try to hop in and help themselves to their seed!  Any cheeky bird that dares to enter their pen is quickly chased away with much clucking and sqwarking!  They’ve all stopped laying at the moment – who can blame them in this weather!

The girls have become very popular with our Farm Shop customers, especially children who make a point of going to say hello when they are shopping.

When the soil is frozen is it really difficult to harvest the crops in the fields.  Greg Secrett, our Farm Director says:-

This weather certainly presents a challenge for us here at the Farm.  As soon as there is a sign of a thaw it’s a case of all hands out in the fields.  All the office staff come out to help us harvest as many crops as we can. Some of the harvested crops, such as our leeks, are then taken into our glasshouse to thaw out before they are stripped ready for sale to our customers.  This weather also hinders ploughing, sowing and planting of new crops which causes problems later in the season, but hopefully we are nearly through the extremely cold spell and we will be working hard to keep everything on track!

The vegetable that we are currently harvesting (when we can get them out of the ground!) are January King and Savoy cabbage, red cabbage, green and red kale, beetroot, leeks, parnips and celeriac,

We also have a baby leaf in the glasshouses, baby spinach, baby watercress, flat and curly parsley.

We have several varieties of beetroot at the moment, the traditional round beetroot, Chioggia – which is pink and white striped inside, Golden – a beautiful yellow/gold colour and Cheltenham – a heritage variety that is fantastic roasted, giving a wonderful sweet flavour.

Don’t forget that you can get all our vegetables delivered to your door via our Veg Box delivery service – see our online shop.

Shrove Tuesday (also known as Fat Tuesday in many other countries) is the last day before Lent in the Christian religion.

Traditionally, people used up all the rich foods not allowed during Lent, including butter, fat and eggs – hence the making of pancakes.

Pancake Day has now become a time of celebration with lots of pancake tossing competitions and races taking place in towns, villages all across the UK.

We will be cooking our own pancakes in the Farm Shop and attempting to toss them so come and have a giggle or try your own hand and flipping!

Don’t forget to stock up on your eggs, flour and of course lemons, sugar, golden syrup or whatever you like on your pancakes.   We do also have pancakes mixes on sale.