Take part in the ‘Gardening is Good for You!’ campaign

This March the HTA is encouraging retailers to share this news with their customers with help from the HTA’s ‘Gardening is Good for You!’ campaign, supported by National Garden Gift Vouchers.

For instant impact choose plants at their best through spring including daffodils, tulips, fragrant hyacinth and other flowering bulbs, all perfect for partnering in patio pots and flower beds with seasonal bedding like pansy, viola, wallflower, bellis, forget-me-not, primula and polyanthus.

Gardening is excellent exercise, too. Gently stretching and bending while planting and weeding helps keep you fit and flexible. More active gardening like digging, clearing, raking, sweeping and lawn mowing will also raise your heart rate, and burn off more calories too. Just an hour of active gardening could use around 250-500 calories.

So, tell your customers to forget joining an expensive gym and get active outdoors in your garden instead.

DID YOUR CUSTOMERS KNOW?

The Green Gym run by The Conservation Volunteers uses natural exercise to promote community health. These fun and free outdoor sessions involve activities like tree planting, sowing flower meadows and creating wildlife ponds. By connecting with nature the Green Gym enhances mental wellbeing, helping people contribute something positive to their community. Find out more at www.tcv.org.uk/greengym.

PLANTS OF THE MOMENT: SPRING COLOUR & SPRING PLANTING

Whether it’s drifts of golden daffodils or a multi-coloured kaleidoscope of tulips, spring bulbs are the perfect choice to fill borders, patio pots and window boxes.

Keep the colour coming by mixing bulbs with seasonal bedding plants including long-flowering wallflowers, frothy forget-me-nots, bold daisy-like Bellis perennis, pansies and dainty violas, or primulas and primroses. Also choose early flowering hardy perennials like brunnera, epimedium, bergenia, hellebores, euphorbia, and a host of others.

PLANT SUGGESTIONS:

Any plants providing Spring Colour eg
Spring flowering bulbs.
Spring bedding plants, including Senetti.
Hardy Perennials such as Perennial Wallflower (Erysimum ‘Bowles’s Mauve’ AGM), Hellebores, Euphorbia, Bergenia and Bruunera ‘Jack Frost’ AGM.
Green perennials to plant now such as Paeonia, Lupin, Delphinium, Hollyhock (Alcea), Digitalis.
Spring flowering shrubs:
Erica x darleyensis eg ‘Ghost Hills’ AGM
Clematis armandii ‘Apple Blossom’ AGM
Oregon Grape - Mahonia aquifolium ‘Apollo’ AGM
Pieris japonica eg ‘Passion’, ‘Flaming Silver’ AGM
Skimmia japonica ‘Rubella’ AGM
Camellia, Azaleas, Rhododendrons