Show us your gardening purchases 2025

That's handy, I could do with one to take sacks of compost down the garden.

 

If you have a nearby Homebase, they might have stock. Reduced from £45 to £22.50.

 

There's no Homebase near here @ViewAhead but I've had a look on Amazon and seen several on there. I might send for one.

 

I bought one of those years ago, I didn't find it very useful for anything heavy, I bought a standard non folding sack barrow in the end.

 

Yesterday I ordered 2 bareroot "Silas Marner" roses from David Austin. I have been wanting Silas Marner since seeing one in a Dobbies garden centre several months back, where I had gone to pick up a different rose. The photo below is from the David Austin website.

 

Sounds like Homebase is selling off stock to close down like the one near me did.

 

It is! Like a ghost warehouse in mine now. All the garden centre stuff has been removed from the outside area.

 

I bought some seed potatoes sold loose - Orla, Caledonian Pearl, Kestral, and I got 3 of each for my tubs ...
and a packet of onion seeds - De Paris, they are small onions suitable for pickling apparently, but I'll be using them as ordinary onions because they're small and they'll suit me better.

I can't remember if I said I bought some pea seeds a while ago - Ambassador, they're dwarf plants so will be good for my raised bed. They were being sold loose so I just got a handful and they only cost a few pennies

 

My sale bargain from Gardening Express yesterday .
Gaultheria procubens " Festive Beauty".
6 plants @ £1 each plus £6 p and p,
Jenny namaste

 

I have been to B and Q and bought a heated propagator. Also a riddle and a deck brush. And joined the B and Q club.
I also dropped off a load of cook books for their charity sales.

 

Telephoned GC. I have just bought a load of soil improver, JI No3 and Manure which is being delivered tomorrow as I do not want to stink the car out like last time.

 

I am a depressed plant purchaser. It’s entirely my own fault. Hope over experience.

So, last spring I purchased two corydalis - one Elata and one Craigton Blue. £15 with p&p. On arrival, I was not convinced the Elata was Elata … and it proved not to be. Didn’t flower in June, didn’t have scent, didn’t have true blue flowers. Anyway, that turned out to be the success of the 2. The (alleged) Craigton Blue was a very feeble specimen with only a couple of leaves. These yellowed and died and no more grew through. End of! Was mightily fed up. Corydalis can be tricky to keep going from yr to yr, but I do expect one summer of enjoyment from them.

Scroll on to this yr, and again I succumb and buy an Elata. (They are quite hard to find, which makes them all the more appealing somehow.) It arrived today. It may be an Elata. It is hard to say. The pot was squashed flat and empty. The package was full of loose potting material which was absolutely bone dry. In the mix was a little root ball, about the size of a ping-pong ball with some very battered, broken-stemmed leaves scattered about. A sorry mess. A tiny bit of greenery is still attached, so I have potted it up and will have to wait and see.

But it certainly has not hit that sweet spot of horticultural satisfaction that lights up when you open a package you have been waiting for and see a healthy thing smiling at you, full of potential and bursting to get going.

 

Sorry to hear about your disappointment @ViewAhead. I looked for a nursery that stocks Corydalis when you mentioned them earlier and found Farmyard Nurseries in Carmarthenshire, a Chelsea gold medal winner. I don’t know them but @Michael Hewett or @CarolineL may do. There are some varieties in stock now but not the ones you have bought. May be worth a look.

 

Thanh you, @Plantminded. I have seen their stock. I am a little bit obsessed. My google history is littered with Corydalis searches.

Honestly, I am a fool to myself. I should just attach my passion to an easier plant. Something comes over me every yr in Jan/Feb, and I start hunting. By March I’m back to realising I have too many plants already, and sense takes over.

 

Their nursery is in Llandysul and I'm not familiar with that area at all, it's quite a distance from here. However they've got a little garden centre in Carmarthen town and I can't resist calling there whenever I'm in Carmarthen. They have so many interesting and unusual plants, it's impossible to come away from there without buying something.