Gardening Tips & Trends

Autopot summer inspiration

In August Brett and I headed off to England for the annual Autopot summer exhibition. This is Britain’s premier event for all things Autopot. It was a great opportunity to talk to other Autopot us...

Winter surprises

This month I was privileged to talk at both the Waikanae Garden Circle and the Kapiti Horticultural Society and have the Tree Croppers Association visit the shop. These groups have a wealth of know...

Winter is here

Workshop with Hannah Zwartz - Kapiti Green Gardener In May we hosted Hannah Zwartz the Kapiti Green Gardener for a well-attended and very inspiring workshop on planning the garden for spring. The ...

May for Manure crops and Mulch

Green Manure crops and mulching May is one of those cross over months for the garden. I start to think about bedding some areas down for winter and feeding the soil where greedy crops may have st...

Exciting times

Chili harvest Exciting times as we harvested chili this week. What a stunning harvest we have this year. The chili plants are definitely the star plants this month – only just beating out the pu...

Autumn Community Spirit

In February, the community Defibrillator was installed on the main road at the New World in Otaki. Otaki Hydroponics were involved with Rotary to fund raise for this valuable community asset with ...

October - Time for Russian Roulette

I always feel that October is the month for playing Russian Roulette. It’s the month of “Will I, won’t I” plant out. We have plants we have tended in the greenhouse just waiting to be planted int...

The Gift of Growing

Over the last few years my style of Christmas shopping has changed considerably. The main question I now ask myself before I hit the shopping, is what do they NEED, will they use it? And will it br...

Stripping For a Reason

Have you tried it? Stripping back the leaves of your hot house veges. I have spent a few hours this week doing exactly this in our hot house at work and I am already amazed at how much better every...

Good To Go

Gardening is the greatest teacher of so many things, in particular patience, and just when you think you have all your ducks lined up nature dishes up a curve ball. Well, not so much as a curve ba...