Wednesday 27 July 2011

Fairy Magnolia Blush featured in NZ Woman’s Weekly

It was great to see the Fairy Magnolia Blush appear in New Zealand’s Woman’s Weekly magazine.

See an extract of the article below.

“Fairy Magnolia Blush is another of Mark Jury’s babies and the first release of a new range of compact-growing cultivars with increased flower colour and size.

If left to its own devices, it will grow to about 4m high x 2m wide. It’s fast growing, making it ideal for screening and hedging.

Being amenable to clipping and training, it’s also suited to topiary and espalier.

Fragrant flowers open from pink buds in spring and appear randomly until late autumn.”




Friday 22 July 2011

Ohio Short Course show 2011

Another Ohio Short Course show has come to an end and as usual I was surprised by the continued innovation that appears at this show – it must now be one of the major shows on the calendar for most in the Horticultural Industry with attendees from around the globe visiting to see what is new or doing well in the US market.

Imagine my surprise to see a number of our Bonfire series either in mixed arrangements; used in promotional pieces for the Daniels Plant Food company that adorned pillars throughout the show and even in the mixed planters outside of our hotel – the Bonfire series continues to prove to be an extremely versatile product with multiple uses and certainly is the benchmark of all the Boliviensis varieties that suddenly appeared after Bonfire was released.

The merchandising displays this year hit a new level with fierce competition between entrants to show how best to display plants at retail.

Despite continually improving showcases of plants by the various companies exhibiting at the show - my vote for the best display overall was a display that greeted all on entering the show which had the attractive butterfly mix seen in the attached images.

I look forward to next year’s show and hope that the exhibitors continue to put the effort in developing showcases that demonstrate what can be achieved with the great new introductions many of us are releasing into the market.