Trees & young plants

Hi folks, We are starting a new venture here at Pathhead and it really is in its infancy.

Two years ago I managed to wrestle a 3/4 acre piece of ground back from my horsey girls, a starvation paddock which had been under grass for some 20 years. This was probably the most hungry, open, wind-blasted place on the whole farm. Maybe not the best place to grow ornamental trees.

First thing we did was to plant it with Leylandii hedging to the north and east, (I can hear the screams already). No apologies, Leylandii does what it say on the tin, grows extremely quickly and is a great wind killer. We ploughed the whole site over adding loads of horse manure to the soil. In year 1 we planted a few vegetables and started to get the ground cleaned up, lots of weeeding, hoeing and mulching with various different mediums (Mushroom compost, leaf mold, cardboard and spent hay and different forms of man-made coverings) we got some very interesting results. and will be using some of these methods in the growing of our young trees. More to come on that.

This year we have bought in some young plant material for growing on and we have done a lot of seed sowing, the results of which we will hopefully see this spring. Much of what we've bought in is to be used as root stock material for grafting but what with the double whammy of covid and brexit, there is a delay in availability in lots of stock material.

Tree nurseries take a very long time to produce the kind of stock you're looking for in a garden centre and that's the market that we're working towards. Over the next few years we'll be growing a range of different species and a range of budded and grafted varieties (cultivars) of both ornamental and fruit trees. As young stock comes on we will make some plants available for sale as well as selling some more established specimen plants (Particularly Japanese Maples) which we used to grow in quantity a few years ago.

Because the nursery is in its infancy we will be limited in what we will have for sale but as time goes on we will increase our range and availability. In the meantime if we can help with supply in any way we will be delighted to quote.

From March onwards there will be a few trees available to see and purchase from the nursery.