Gardeners Belfast

Flower Pot Gardeners Belfast is an established award winning firm which achieved the Judges Supreme Award at Hillsborough in 2007. Our aim is to widen your options to make the most of your budget, and provide Belfast gardeners services to Belfast and the surrounding areas with individually tailored landscape design solutions that suit your lifestyle.

Flower Pot Gardeners Belfast will also provide you with high quality professional gardening services, including garden maintenance. We offer our clients fair and reasonable prices and won’t break the bank!

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Garden Design

You’ve got a mature garden, one you’ve tended lovingly for many years. Every available space is used. You’ve got beds of flowers which provide three seasons of color, maybe even four. Your trees and shrubs are mature, you have lovely pathways accented with benches for a relaxing moment, a ’secret’ garden for the kids and a well established vegetable garden, producing a healthy bounty every year. You’ve even got your garden to the point of requiring very little maintenance. How can you possibly improve on this picture? Garden figurines can be your icing on the cake, lending that final gourmet touch to your beautiful garden.

photo credit: breekp

Maybe your garden is still in the work-in-progress stage. You’re still adding and refining. You’ve just completed a pathway, leading to your secret garden, a place to relax or for kid’s play. Garden figurines should figure into your design of this area of the garden. Garden figurines and statuary can be as simple as a small, whimsical bronzed frog, seated at the edge of the bench, atop a small pedestal, ready to greet you as you sit down with a book and a tall glass of lemonade. Larger garden figurines, reminiscent of the lion statues flanking the steps of New York City’s Metropolitan Museum can add an elegant statement to your secret garden’s official entry. Religious garden statuary can create a soothing environment, placed next to a bench, or serving as a point for contemplation along a garden pathway.

Garden globes and sundials are other forms of garden figurines which can create a dramatic effect, given the right placement. Both of these are usually used as ‘centerpieces’, placed at the center of a circular brick or paving stone feature, or at the center of a formal herb garden. Garden globes come in a variety of colors, which you can use to coordinate with the colors of a surrounding bed of flowers. A yellow garden globe contrasts nicely with a bed of flowers in shades of blues and purples, providing a focal point which showcases the flower bed. Sundials, the first timekeepers, are fascinating garden additions, giving pleasure to both kids and adults.

When considering the placement of a particular garden statue or figurine, allow enough free space around the piece to be sure garden visitors can easily view it ” don’t hide it in a dense patch of ground cover! If the piece is small, ensure that there’s at least 6-12 inches of ground around it. Installing edging ensures that your figurine won’t become overgrown. Alternatively, set the figurine on a pedestal.

Nurseries and home improvement centers carry large assortments of garden figurines from which to choose, in a variety of sizes suited to every garden situation. There are also stores which specialize in garden figurines and statuary. You’ll find selections in stone, finished cement, as well as wood, bronze and other metals.

Garden figurines are a great way to add refinement and elegance to your garden. Go take a look at what’s available. One thing leads to another. You may end up with a collection!

Technorati Tags: Business and Economy, Flower, Garden, gardening, Home, Home and Garden, Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York City, Shrub

Propagating Houseplants by Leaf Cuttings

photo credit: Nadia308

As might be expected, most plants suited to this method of propagation have comparatively soft and fleshy leaves. There are two types of leaf cuttings : those that make use of leaf and stem and those requiring the leaf alone. An example of the first is the dainty African violet and of the second, the gorgeous Begonia Rex.

Merely knock the plant from its pot, tease away some of the soil from the roots and with a sharp knife cut away the new shoots together with the roots closest to them. Pot these up in fresh soil. Well grown Saint Paulias or African Violets after a time grow to a stage where they should be divided if they are to continue growing and blooming. In this case again knock the plant from its pot and gently ease away much of the soil, damaging the roots as little as possible. It will be seen that instead of a single plant there are in fact a considerable number and many of these can be gently separated from the mass and potted up individually.

A considerably more artificial derivation of the layering process is known as air layering. It is particularly useful for the following reason. Many plants such as the rubber plant gradually lose their lower leaves so we are left with a long, naked stem with a tuft of foliage at the top. This is both hideous and a demonstration of our inability to grow the plant properly. If we can take the tuft at the top and make a new plant from it, then we can begin again.

Actually it is possible merely to cut off the green and growing tuft at the top of the plant and to strike this as a cutting, but high soil temperatures and humidity are required, so we can use instead the following simpler method.

The begonia leaf can be cut into several sections and so long as each cut has been made to sever one of the prominent veins, roots will grow from this part. The spear like Sanscvieria can be cut into two inch sections. Each of the sections, from begonia or sansevieria, should be planted with the end originally nearest the stem or base into the soil.

The new plant (for that is what it is) can then be cut away from the naked stem below and potted up in the usual manner.

Technorati Tags: Begonia, Biology, gardening, Gardens, Houseplant, Humidity, Leaf, Plant, Saintpaulia

Some Gardening Tips for Indoor Gardeners

All plants grown under conditions such as these should have their pots plunged inside a larger and waterproof pot with the space between the two packed with some moisture retentive material such as peat.

photo credit: Rachel Zack

If this material is kept constantly moist, but not soaking wet, this moisture will be absorbed by the plant pot as it is required. This moist material will also give off a surprising amount of humidity, normally wafting it upwards through the leaves of the plant above.

So in the garden room or home extension we shall be wise not to dot our plants about the place as we do in the home proper, but to group them in concentrated colonies for the good of their health.

Normally in most commercial greenhouses plants are grown on benches or shelving which is covered with a layer of shingle, sand, peat or ashes. This is kept moist and the plants benefit. It is possible to obtain simple automatic trickle irrigation equipment, similar to that used in so many commercial greenhouses, which will take care of plants in this fashion when they must be left for long periods, even the entire day.

There are many ways in which this can be achieved, depending mainly on the personal tastes of the person concerned. On the small scale it is possible to make little indoor gardens of half a dozen or so small plants all planted or plunged together in a large container such as an antique bowl or wash basin.

On the large scale it is possible to devote the major part of a single wall to a stepped display of plants. If a stepped rack is constructed it can hold whole banks of flowers and at the same time provide an excellent hiding place for the necessary bucket, watering can, fertilizer bottle or pack, even the dust-pan and brush.

Technorati Tags: Anthurium, backyard garden, Fertilizer, Garden, gardening, Greenhouse, Houseplant, Humidity, Plant

Some Free Tips on Indoor Plants Decorating

On table top or window sill the greatest virtues and advantages of this plant would be vastly reduced in value.

photo credit: Ted Percival

Let trailers hang by placing them on a pedestal, shelf, for they look better, more natural this way and give greatest value. Use sprawlers to cover the bare soil area of surrounding pots or to writhe uninhibited across a mantelpiece. Judicious pinching out of misplaced or too strong shoots will keep a bush looking like a bush and encourage a spear-like plant to remain looking this way.

Vivid colours, yellow, orange, white and brilliant red are advancing. They come out to meet you and so tend to make a room appear to be shorter if placed at the far end. And conversely, dark colors, mainly greens of course, are receding and tend to look farther away than they really are, thus lengthening a short room. A tall rubber plant or fatshedera will make a room look higher, for the eye tends to follow the growth upwards, while a high ceiling can appear to be lower if horizontal growing plants catch the eye.

An impression of warmth is given if a wall is covered with the trained tendrils and shoots of a growing plant or if warm colors are used. And as might be expected, a hot summer day can be cooled indoors by the decorative use of cool greens, purples and dark colors in general.

Regard, for example, the cissus, rhoicissus, ivy, several philodendrons and the dramatic monstera, to say nothing of the huge and rampant tetrastigma. All of these can be trained to cover a wall, to climb to the ceiling and follow the wall around the room. One tetrastigma in our possession once grew near the front door, climbed to the ceiling, was led along to the stairway, climbed up the stair well and was stopped just before it invaded one of the bedrooms. One ten year old cissus still grows happily in a Victorian washbowl without drainage holes. It frames an arch between kitchen and dining-room and shows no signs of its hardships suffered when building operations dictated its removal and storage, twisted and tangled like a cat-teased ball of knitting wool, for several months before being unravelled and trained once again along its almost invisible supports of cotton.

A great chlorophytum stands six feet high in the bowl of an old oil-lamp standard, its elegant green and white striped grass like leaves arching into the air and its long stems bearing the little white flowers and the young plants at their ends swooping outwards to hang in graceful clusters.

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How To Grow Bonsai in The Most Popular Styles

Simply put, the miniaturized versions of bigger trees are what we call Bonsai trees. They’re alive and they’re not plastics that look similar to each other. There are indeed different bonsai styles like the bigger trees. In fact, their shapes and forms are what please the bonsai tree holders. These styles are formal upright, informal upright, cascade, semi cascade, slant and windswept. These are the different types of bonsai trees available for shaping, training or forming. Knowing the styles enable the bonsai lovers to choose specific pots for the specific style the bonsai tree is trained to be and decide which caring tips they need to grow the trees beautifully.

Upright styles: Formal and Informal

Formal upright style is the style where the trunk of the tree is straight upwards and the first lower branches are far wider than the rest. The preceding branches will then proceed to shape an overall triangular look for the tree. This is a great shape for beginners to practice with. Trees that are suitable for these types of bonsai trees style are Pine, Larch, Juniper and Spruce. The informal upright style is similar to the formal upright except that the top branch needs to be extended forward instead of upwards. This lends the tree an impression of motion.

Slant types of bonsai trees

If the Informal upright types of bonsai trees style are suitable for Beech, Japanese maple and Trident Maple trees, this slant style can be chosen for almost all bonsai trees. This is the style wherein the trunk extends to one direction while the lowest branch extends to the other direction. This style is quite common and very easy to shape and train.

Cascade style Bonsai

If they do not like the simple styles of upright and slant, then they can choose among the cascade and semi cascade styles. These styles have a sloping effect plus the trunk is vertical and turned to one direction. Aside from that, the branches are trained to slope or cascade lower than the surface of the pot. Sometimes, some people do not want the trunks turned into one direction so they choose the semi-cascade style, which is the same as the cascade style except the trunk gradually slopes.

Windswept style Bonsai

The windswept style looks like the bonsai tree has been beset by strong winds. It looks a bit unruly and beautifully unkempt. These are most of the common styles that bonsai plants are usually trained to be.

Prune to produce different styles of Tree

Getting the style of bonsai tree you want is easy. All you have to do is prune and trim. These styles have been practiced for centuries as an art form. This is one of the most important maintenance issues of this particular plant. Aside from shaping the bonsai into the desired form, pruning and trimming could maintain balance of the bonsai tree as you reduce growth taking place above the ground.

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It’s Time To Consider Your 2009 Lawn Care Plan

Before you know it, winter will be over, snow will be melted and the lawn weeds will once again rear their ugly heads. Will you be ready?

I have to figure that most of you are going to wait until the last minute to figure out what you are going to do with the grass this season. But you need to be ready to get out and put down the lawn treatments to make the lawn grow properly and keep out the nasty weeds. These tips should help you start your plan of action for this year.

The primary thing to think about is the type and kind of fertilizer you plan to put down. When I say that, I mean that you will need to figure out the makeup of the elements. I really don’t like the super high nitrogen dosed fertilizers as they offer very little to the lawn outside of a growth spurt. You really should try to find a fert that has some phosphorus and potassium as well.

I also recommend you get an organic based fertilizer for the summer months. These types of fertilizer release into the soil very slowly, thus preventing browning from over application. They also provide a great source of long term, slow release elements that are healthy for the turf.

After we have chosen out fertilizer, we need to figure out how we are going to eliminate the impending weed infestation. Now, I really don’t want you guys to use over the counter weed and feed products like you can get at the home improvement stores. These are completely bad for the environment because spreading them just slings the weed killing chemicals everywhere. We need something with more control.

Always use liquid weed control and spot spray or target the weeds where they are and no where else.

Finally we need to think about the icing on this lawn cake. You are definitely going to want to lay down some iron. Iron for the lawn turns in that dark blue color that your neighbors will envy. On top of that, let’s be sure to throw in some insect treatment for the grubs and cinche bugs, as well as a fungal treatment for the late spring to top it all off. Now you are cooking!

Well guys, that’s it! You should be all set if you can get some good fertilizer, carefully spot targeted weed killer and a little iron. Throw in the insect treatment and you have the makings of a beautiful lawn this summer. Don’t worry, it’s not that difficult!

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Different Types Of Cactus Plants

Mealybugs and scale insects can be two of the most aggressive bugs to attack cacti and succulents. New seedling plants are also subject to damage, but the main pest of these plants is when they are over watered by their owners.

There are many varieties, more than a thousand to choose from, and we are going to list a few of the more popular ones. For many reasons, these types have proven to be great houseplants.

A Christmas Cactus, which also goes by the name zygocactus truncatus, is admired for its mid-winter flowers. It grows in a cluster of leaf-life joints extending from a single base. The flowers run up to 3 inches long, are deep red in color and will bloom from October to January.

This particular cactus is aided by being placed outside during the summer months. It should be only be watered sparsely once it is brought back inside. This is only necessary until it shows signs of blooming again, then watering should be increased. It should be planted in loose soil, and it does not need sand, unlike other varieties of cacti. It tends to be droopy and would be best planted in a hanging basket.

The Peanut Cactus is another popular cactus of the succulent family. It is very different from its cousin the Christmas Cactus. It is a lower growing plant it seldom grows over 3 inches tall. It is made up of clusters of joints that are covered by soft white spines. It has large, funnel shaped flowers and it propagated by cutting the joints.

Another variety is the Night-Blooming Cereus, as the name implies, it flowers will only open at night. There are many different varieties of the Night-Blooming Cactus. Some of which can grow to be very high in stature. In the houseplant variety, it can grow to a height of 3 or 4 feet and it blooms large white colored flowers.

The Orchid Cactus, is also in the same family as the Christmas Cactus. But this cactus blooms in the spring and summer, as opposed to the winter time. There are dozens of types of this cactus, all have exquisite blooms and can reach tremendous height and size.

Aloes are in the succulent family, they grow heavy lily-shaped leaves that sprout from a single base. They can be either fully green or green with white and silver stripes and spots.

Aloes can often be mistaken for the Agave, the Century Plant. They strongly resemble each other. The Crown-Of-Thorns is known by the botanical name Euphorbia. It can be grown upright or trained to vine, it has a thick stem and succulent spiny leaves. This plant needs more moisture and humidity than many other succulents or the yucca cane.

The Jade Plant, or Crassula, is another typical succulent plant, it has flat, round leaves that are bright green or can be variegated in color as well. This plant is easy for a even a novice to grow, and will withstand almost anything except over watering.

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Build a beautiful deck with the help of star burst railings

This article gives information about the various features of star burst railings. It describes the unique design of these railings and how they impart a stunning and gorgeous look to the deck.

If you are bored by looking at the same pattern of design for your deck, then you can install star burst railings and bring about a whole new look to the deck. With star burst railings, the deck will have a trendy look and to add to this, it also gives you more privacy while having a relaxing time on the deck. These railings are designed by playing with the balusters in such a way that it gives out the appearance of spindles that start as a cluster from the bottom rail and thin out as they reach the rail at the top.

If you use star burst railing designs that are made out of wood as the material for construction, then the whole process becomes relatively simple and the final result is beautiful and elegant. All you need to make sure is that you adhere very strictly to the building code requirements that are relevant to your area.

The benefit of the star burst design is that there is no rigidity about using them in isolation. This means that they can be used very effectively by combining them with various other railing designs. This is one reason why star burst railings are so much in vogue today. In fact, when star burst railings are used as the definitive feature in combination designs, it appears very classy and trendy. In other words, by incorporating this railing into your overall deck design, your deck will have a very modern look that will give you a lot of joy and pride. If you are skeptical about the number of star burst patterns that you should include in your deck design, a good idea would be to look at the size of the deck and then arrive at a rational decision so that the ultimate result looks apt and definitely not overdone.

The materials that are normally used for constructing star burst railings are wrought iron and wood. Aluminum which has wonderful qualities like light weight and durability and is relatively easy to maintain is also a good alternative for constructing star burst railings. If these railings are made out of wood or wrought iron they can blend easily with different styles of railings. However, if these railings are made from wood they cannot be kept outdoors as it may lead to the material being damaged due to the rain and harsh rays of the sun. So, for outdoor settings, star burst railings made from wrought iron and aluminum are preferable.

Read more information regarding metal porch railing and related articles that are available here.

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Winter Landscaping - What You Need To Know

photo credit: Kyknoord

by Andrew Caxton

While winter landscaping is not something that most people think about, it is an important part of taking care of your landscaping. Consider the benefits in reducing your costs.

While you may not have thought of winter landscaping, there are plenty of bnefits to doing it. One is to reduce fuel costs which are high enough today! The fact is, you can cut your cost by some 40 percent if you plan do take action. One way is to plan windbreaks around your property (on the west, east and north) to avoid wind blowing at the house. As these plants grow, they insulate your home enough to reduce your fuel costs!

What To Use

The best windbreaks available to you are trees and shrubs that have a low crown. To move the wind over the house instead of at it, plant an evergreen, along with a natural berm. Avoid planting on the south side of your home, though. You want the sun to be able to heat up your home whenever possible. You should also consider how tall the plants will grow. Plant them at least a foot from your home. In addition, plant them at between two and five times the grown height against the house.

Add Beauty, Too

Winter lawn care or john deere snowblowers can also add benefit to your home in looks. To make your winter landscaping look beautiful and even graceful, be sure that you take steps to make this happen. It can add interest and appeal to the landscape. Be sure that you manage your landscaping too. Taking the time to add a beautiful evergreen also means keeping the snow mounds off it.

You can also place specific plants and trees that will attract specific birds during the wintertime. Use those that produce brightly colored berries, for example. Choose a plant that has a unique color, style or shape. You may want a plant that has a unique bark texture to it to add even more interest. Consider a cranberry bush viburnum, which will have plenty of berries on them. It also has a beautiful flower in the middle of May and June. It will definitely add interest to your winter landscaping and provides something unique in the otherwise boring winter wonderland!

Alternatively, consider other bushes that work. For example, the Japanese barberry is a good choice. It will grow to four or six feet and will have amazingly colored red purple leaves during autumn. It also produces berries to bring the birds in.

Choosing the right plants for your landscaping will add character and plenty of fuel savings to your home!

Andrew Caxton is the copywriter of http://www.lawn-mowers-and-garden-tractors.com . Find more publications about john deere snowblowers at his website.

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