2015 Plant Catalogue Now Online

 

 The New 2015 Plant Catalogue for Abriachan Nurseries is now online and landing on doorsteps around the country.

We hope you enjoy this years selection, the plants we list in our catalogue have proven their worth as good garden plants, or are part of one of our collections such as Auricula & Helianthemum
We also like our plants to have a little “je ne sais quoi” whether that be lovely scent, a flash of subtle colour, or just looking right in the place or association where they grow.
Click here to download the pdf of the catalogue

 

This year has the addition of a new Falkland Island Page where we have increased our selection of plants from this remote, unique and beautiful part of the world.

 

And my garden ideas for this year, I am going to re-read the books of Christopher Lloyd. As his years matured he introduced more colour into his garden. And that is where I am in 2015, the year of colour. I love annuals and will be planting all I can, additionally Dahlias and Lilies and who knows what else.
Watch our Flickr site and my blogs for ideas and progress.
I am also working up some “planting recipes“, a selection of gardening ideas for you to consider trying, along with instructions and prices.  They will be on our web site.
Good gardening
Margaret Davidson

2014 Catalogue - Now Online

So our daughter Cat and her partner Brad are on The Falkland Islands…that is bringing back so many memories. Memories of the Camp, the wildlife and the vivid gardens full of sun loving annuals. 

The Falkland Islands were sunny, cool and windy too of course but I remember many, many sunny days. 
The new 2014 catalogue cover that Cat has done is great, showing three wonderful Falkland icons , Rockhopper Penguins, Islander planes and the Falkland island slipper plant Calceolaria fothergillii.

Our trips to New Zealand continue too, and so our love affair with the southern hemisphere goes on.

Back here On Loch Ness it has been an extraordinary mild winter. We have been spared much of the rain and storms that have plagued the south of England and Wales. It will be very interesting to see how things grow away, with so little check to their growth.

The February garden at Abriachan is a delight of snowdrops, snowflakes and the Daphne bholua sends a long trail of intoxicating scent along the pathways. The evergreens are slick and healthy and the flower buds on the Rhododendrons and Camellias are fat and full of promise, the soil is heaving with bulbs emerging as we move the leaf fall aside.

Spring is on the move.


Margaret

View our 2014 Plant Catalogue Online
Download the 2014 Plant Catalogue

2013 Plant Catalogue - Now Online

ABRIACHAN 30 YEARS ON

 

So, how did that happen? Suddenly it is 30 years on.

We arrived at Abriachan in 1983 after 12 years living and working in the Falkland Islands. It took us time to settle, but somehow, setting up the nursery and beginning the garden did the job.

We began as all gardens should, by planting vegetables and soft fruit, but the stony soil and the oak and hazel woodlands drew us on up the hill.

So what began with a few alpines, swiftly gained momentum? Don sweated away creating dry stone walls and paths, criss-crossing the hill side and gradually our woodland and dry slope garden took shape.

I believe gardens are always a reflection of their owners and we are no different. We have lived overseas in New Zealand and the Falklands and we grow plants from both places as they mean something to us and also do pretty well in our climate.  Living in Scotland we must accept the limitations of the weather, but nevertheless we find ourselves pushing the boundaries of hardiness all of the time.

Every year we do something new in the garden, and there is still so much to learn. Like many gardeners, we have some favourites and start collections, my personal passions are the old fashion primroses and auricula, and there will be more yet.

It has been 30 years of huge interest and fun.  All of our family have contributed in so many ways and together with our staff and the many in our community who have encouraged us over the years; and not least you, our customers who have made our imaginings come true. We have made something beautiful between us.

Thank you all.

Margaret Davidson

The 2013 Abriachan Nurseries Plant Catalogue is now online  to download as a pdf and to purchase online through paypal
Hardcopies will be sent out in the post in the next weeks, please contact us if you would like to be added to the mailing list

Adventuring into the tangled web

Being a small plant nursery owner is rather unlikely to make you rich, even when you have Nessy on your side and many points running in your favour:

1. Our nursery is a small operation - family owned and run (With the assistance of several knowledgeable, loyal and wonderful women) and we are located on a beautiful hillside in one of the most gorgeous areas of Scotland.  
2. We choose our plants carefully, grow them in our own woodland garden to assess their hardiness, vigour, beauty, scent and suitability for Scottish gardeners, and only then sell them in our nursery.
   Buying from us, you know that the plants have been well grown from strong stock, well educated on Radio 4, and hardened off to cope with challenging Scottish temperatures.
3. We grow and sell many rare and unusual varieties that can trickier to propagate and maintain, so are infrequently stocked by the big nurseries as they are not perceived to be worth the time and energy required.
4. We also sell more exotic varieties influenced by our time in New Zealand and the Falkland Islands, varieties which may not have been considered by many gardeners until they see them growing this far North.

All these positive factors are in themselves, not always enough to rake in the millions, and whilst we have a strong and loyal base of customers - the convenience and illusory value of plants available in a wealth of supermarkets and hardware stores has impacted on many small nurseries. 

And so, several years ago we reached out to the Internet to expand our horticultural presence - our website has grown and improved and we have made tentative social media explorations through Flickr galleries, a Facebook page, a new Pinterest page (Still finding our feet) and of course this blog to expand our customer base and hopefully allow technological word-of-mouth to tempt more gardeners to Abriachan. 

Will the 'likes' and 'stars', 'shares' and 'comments' translate into more people in the nursery and more plants in the post? Maybe, maybe not, time will tell, yet no matter what, we have gained many new friends and been made to feel welcome as part of the online community.

As we have grown our own blog, I have discovered the wonderful world of gardening bloggers, who share their stories, their humour, their knowledge and their passion for gardening with the wider world.
Great sites like Blotanical (which hopefully will survive its current difficulties),  Garden Grab @ Fennel & Fern, Gardeners Voice and many others allow for easy exploration of a worldwide community of gardening blogs and it is rather too easy to fall down the rabbit hole of reading and following links from one blog to another.

We still send out our plant catalogue in the mail each year, as I believe you can never replace the tactile experience of reading through plant descriptions and choosing your selection by hand with a cat on your knee. 
Many of our customers have only ever ordered by mail, we have never met face to face, yet we often feel a friendship develop, with lovely handwritten notes included with their orders, and comments on how the plants are growing in their gardens.  They trust us to provide them with quality plants and when necessary to substitute a plant that we think they might enjoy if we are sold out of one that has been requested. 
We were wary that the Internet might not nurture the same personal relationships with our customers, and while it is true that orders from the website are less likely to include personal notes, we have been delighted at the warmth and encouragement we have received through comments on the blog and even more delightful, the personal visits from some other bloggers from around the country, who may never have discovered us had we not stepped deeper into the web-world.

So we shall venture onward, thank you for walking with us on this path.
The Davidsons

Badger Shenanigans

After much mud, sweat and tea (rs), the 2012 plant catalogue is off to the printers.
This years front cover shows the local badgers cavorting on the beehive during one of their midnight raids. 
Does anyone else have badgers making themselves at home in your garden?

Cat

Plants in the post - The art of gardening by mailorder.

Our Abriachan Nurseries 2011 plant catalogue came out in February, and is now in residence in sitting rooms around the UK; nestled under gardening books on the coffee table, shoved into a teetering pile of garden catalogues, hiding under the yellow pages never to be seen again; or more hopefully sitting well thumbed on the writing desk or perched on a stack of pots in the greenhouse with a multitude of grubby thumb prints to testify that it has been well browsed over a cup of tea and a digestive.

As spring is the time of year when you may be thinking about ordering from a garden catalogue (not just ours, but I will personally vouch for the fact that we are fabulous) I thought I would put together a blog on 'How to get the best out of your mail order', a topic that is hopefully not as dry as you might imagine.

So why buy mail order at all?

•  To find a bargain - yes, this is true, but always think before you buy, a hundred small tender plants early in the season will need careful looking after and therefore cost more in the long term.  Also check the plant you are buying is the same size and variety as the one illustrated ( Fancy pictures may not match the listing) 
• To save time - You would rather spend your spare time out getting grubby in the garden, than getting to and searching through a garden centre.  Moreover, ordering by catalogue can be done in the evening; with Radio 4 and the cat; when the garden is no longer an occupational option. 
• To find a specialist plant that you can’t find elsewhere easily  - Most gardens will have a few speciality ranges and will have developed strong stock and hopefully reliable varieties and cultivars.
• You live in the back of beyond and havn’t much choice, as you even order your underwear by mail order.
• You like receiving parcels (And there is no shame in that)

 So how to go about ordering

• Catalogue type - The choice is now between a hardcopy catalogue or an online store, and many nurseries will have both available so it is down to personal preference.
  You may prefer a hard catalogue as you can keep it handy and go through it, ticking as you go while having a dram, then you find you have spent a small fortune, or it needs to be vetted by the significant other. (We often find that many of our orders are written out by a women, but the cheques are from the husband, read into that what you will) You can then re-choose until your final decision is established and then move online if you wish to make the final purchase. (checking online can also be useful to see if a particular plant is still in stock)
  Hardcopy catalogues are usually produced only once or twice a season, so can age quite quickly especially as regarding choice and the more unusual plants – the early bird gets the worm, so sooner you order after receiving the catalogue, the more likely you are to get your choice.
• Pricing - when choosing your plants, weigh up such considerations as the size of the pot, the rarity of the plant and the ease of growth.  These are all factors that may alter a plants cost.  Watch out for inflated prices due to 'fashions' in the garden.
• Read the ordering instructions at the front of the catalogue and follow them, if possible using the supplied order form, it may seem obvious, but we do get the most convoluted orders on occasion.
• Payment - It is very advisable to either list alternative plants that you would be happy to receive if there are parts of your order that are unavailable, or if you would not like to receive alternatives, then to write a limit cheque (ie: Not to exceed the value of Sixty Pounds)  this will make it easy for the nursery to alter your total and fill in the cheque to a lesser amount if necessary.
• Postage - look at the catalogue to find amount that the postage costs and you will find it is usually set for a certain number of plants, or amount of ordering value. This is because the nursery will have a contract with their delivery service and will be charged the same if it is one plant or five that is being sent.  For this reason it may not be economical to order small numbers of plants and you are best to take advantage of the maximum you can get in the one parcel before you move up to the next postage bracket.
• Delivery - We always send e-mail or first class letter on the same day when parcel is sent to tell you of the imminent arrival of your plants. It is always a good idea to put a note on your order to inform of dates when you may not be at home to receive the parcel, the last thing you want is your plants dying on your doorstep due to lack of water and light. (We tend not sent out parcels in busy holiday periods as too many people are away from home, we also do not send if the weather is very cold, very hot or very dry as they will suffer in transit)
• Seasons - Order with a common sense attitude to the seasons, ie: it may not be best to order galanthus in the middle of summer, however, some companies do send bare roots through winter.
• Handwriting - Okay, so this is more from our perspective, please oh please oh please write your name and address in a readable hand, we spend many a hour squinting at the most beautifully illegible handwriting trying to work out if it says Mr or a Mrs, Claude or Claire, Norfolk or Suffolk, we have even had to call, to confirm an address to prevent it heading off to a non-existent garden, and that is just embarrassing for everyone.

 So you have read the whole catalogue - highlighted your favourites - whittled it down to your final selection - written your limit cheque, allowable alternatives and 'dates not to send' on the order form.

I would recommend making a quick copy of your order for your own records and to prevent yourself double ordering from another catalogue, and congratulations, you are done, now comes that glorious anticipation as you wait for your order and the joy it contains to arrive.

Enjoy yourself, and if you would like to be added to our yearly mail order list please just drop us an email on info@lochnessgarden.com or give us a call on 01463 861 232
Our catalogue is also online at http://www.lochnessgarden.com/

Listed in RHS "Six UK Exotic Gardens"

I noticed an upsurge in traffic from the Royal Horticultural Society website lately, so had a wee look and was delighted to see that they have included us in a list of Six gardens that contained exotic plants from around the world

They highlight our use of such gems as osteospermum, gazanias, diaramas, crocosmia and schizostylus, all of which I love and which do so well with us on the Loch Side.

We are longtime RHS members and have always had a great relationship with the organisation and the people we have met through it. This was a lovely surprise, and will hopefully help a little as we release our new catalogue in the next few weeks. Every little helps.......