Our accredited nursery is now rainfed, recycled and less polluting
If you think moving house is a hassle, you should try moving a plant nursery! Last year we took the big step of moving our entire production nursery from the historic heartland of Digger’s, Heronswood, to a 20 acre bush property 4km away.
The move has enabled us to expand our
range of plants, streamline our plant production
and despatch and expand our trials of both
vegetables and garden plants.We’re conquering
our weed problems by renovating parts of our
standing grounds with black-plastic under
fresh crushed rock.This also greatly increases
the amount of water we recapture in our dams
so that we can recycle excess irrigation water
on-site saving 6 megalitres. This is a continuing
process where we are working with the Nursery
and Garden Industry of Victoria (NGIV) to
maintain high standards, both for plant health,
but also for the environment.
We’ve employed thousands of unpaid workers
in our nursery; insects. Our Nursery Manager,
Jamie Alcock, has introduced a comprehensive
Integrated Pest Management(IPM) program,
where we are controlling insect pests without
the use of chemical sprays.The whole
philosophy is one of working with nature
rather than against it, using biological means
to control pests rather than drenching them
in chemicals that upset the balance and result
in more chemical applications down the line.
For example, we have successfully controlled
Fungus Gnats by using an Entomopathegenic
nematode applied during the warmest months
to attack the Gnats in their larval stage. Jamie
has also had great success with another of these
nematodes specific to predation on Black Vine
Weevils which are common on the roots of
dormant herbaceous perennials such as sedums,
columbines, catmints and some bulbs.
We have also found through observation and our sticky trap monitoring of insects present in the nursery, that we have healthy populations of ladybirds, hoverflies, parasitic wasps, dragon flies and spiders busily devouring aphids, mealy bugs, whiteflies and thrips.By careful observation of the processes of nature that surround us, we can make use of natural resources in a way that we don’t even realise if we’re not looking.We’re saving water and reducing chemical pollution by following, not fighting, nature.
Over many years of growing plants for mail-order we’ve refined our production system down to three pot sizes that produce the best results for you. All of our perennials and some of our shrubs are grown in Tree Tubes, our premium shrubs and many of our fruiting plants are grown in Super Tubes, whilst our dwarf and heirloom fruit trees are grown in 90mm Olive pots. All of these pots produce strong root-systems that have no circling of roots and will transplant easily into wellprepared ground.
