National Innovation Award shortlisting

FitzGerald Nurseries Ltd has been shortlisted for a National Innovation Award from a nationwide and Island wide group of small, medium and large multi-national companies.

This is great honour for us. Especially as small family farm based rural business to be included with mainstream high tech multi-national companies with specific dedicated R&D companies. I believe this shows that Ireland is now more serious about building its economy to include a second tier of indigenous and niche developed small export focused businesses. As a small enterprise owners operating in an international marketplace dependent on 90% of our sales from exports it is essential that we develop products specific to our company but profitable and fit for our customers purposes. Therefore we must have systems and strategies to ensure this happens at all levels of our economy not just for the large corporate. This is just as essential for a small rural business as it is for multi-national.

FitzGerald Nurseries are proud to be the recipient of this recognition if only to establish a basic principal that Ireland must develop enterprise brick by brick and not in large loose insecure towers of Babel. This innovation must come from the companies on the ground and cannot come from state services but can be supported by them through policy and reform of business categorization.. I would like to thank the Irish Times and Inter Trade Ireland Innovation Awards judging panel for looking deeper into what we do by way of product development.

I would like to thank all who have believed in and supported our efforts over the last few years to develop such a business model and hope this shortlisting gives some recognition to this trust in us.

End.

Kennedy Irish Primrose Collection

Announcing the Kennedy Irish Primrose collection.

A unique collection of Primroses bred over 35 years from old Irish varieties.

I am pleased to reveal the hard work and dedication one of Ireland’s leading amateur primrose breeders, Joe Kennedy, has been acknowledged with the help of FitzGerald Nurseries. We will release several new varieties of “Kennedy Irish Primroses” over the coming three years starting in Spring 2011. In the meantime Joe continues to work on future exciting lines to add to this uniquely Irish range of varieties.

Our ancestors believed that the primrose deterred evil fairies and a scatter of primroses outside the door would keep witches away. My own first contact with primroses came as a child seeing drifts of them growing in the 2000 year old Rath (Celtic Ringfort) on our farm here in County Kilkenny.

Portrait painting of Primrose breeder Joseph Kennedy.

Since then I have had a soft spot for Primroses and now another reason for this is the wonderful work of Joe Kennedy, who hails from Carlow but now lives near Ballycastle, County Antrim. A modest man with exceptional ability as an amateur breeder, his professional training as a dentist has given him a precision and attention-to-detail perfectly suited to the finer points of breeding.

I first met Joe in 2006 having contacted him after reading an article he wrote in an Irish Garden Plant Society (IGPS) Newsletter. We got in touch over the phone and he was soon educating me on the history and breeding of this beautiful plant in Ireland going back to the late 1800's. From that moment on I was hooked on bringing these wonderful plants to the world. Since then I have selected some of Joes best work and we have developed micropropagation protocols so that we can produce sufficient numbers to launch to gardeners in USA and Euope.

A new creation from good stock

With this launch, I hope we can do Joes work some justice by bringing to a much wider audience these wonderful old-style “Kennedy Irish Primroses”. After 35 dedicated years of breeding, we hope it’s a proud moment for Joe also as it certainly is for us.

The first plant launch to start the program coincides with the 50th Anniversary of the inauguration of John F Kennedy as President of USA in January 1961. New additional varieties in this first series will be released through to the 50th Anniversary of his visit to Ireland and death in 1963. This collaboration between a Fitzgerald and a Kennedy to bring old Irish Primroses, all the way from County Wexford, near the old Kennedy homestead, is a typically Irish coincidence. All of the plants are being produced in Co Wexford. We are currently working on 36 more selections. Plants of the first two selections will be available this Spring. Innisfree is a vivid red with yellow eye on dark foliage and Drumcliff another dark foliage variety but this time with larger white flowers tinted with lilac hue when opening. More varieties will follow with yellow, white, peach and pink flowers all on the most intensely dark purple foliage ever seen on Primroses.

All this development will secure local employment in Co Wexford and Co Kilkenny only a stonesthrow from another Irish Kennedy story.

In addition to unique foliage characteristics we are working on other exciting traits all bred by Joe from the old Irish varieties dating back to the late 19th century. I hope gardeners will agree a new direction in the beauty of the Primrose has been born out of these old robust perrenial Irish selections. Many of the later varieties will introduce some of the old “Hose-in-Hose”, “Jack-in-the-Greens” and various matt-forming stoloniferous types. Unique characteristics , just like Joe himself.

In USA you can check availability of Kennedy Irish Primroses at the following.
http://www.peacetreefarm.com/
http://www.skagitgardens.com/
http://www.ppandl.com/
For mail order
http://www.heronswood.com/

Primula Innisfree release in March 2011, must be the darkest foliage Primrose ever!

Seedling selections of future lines

For release in 2012

For release in 2012

The Lake Isle of Innisfree. By William Butler Yeats.

I WILL arise and go now, and go to Innisfree,

And a small cabin build there, of clay and wattles made:

Nine bean-rows will I have there, a hive for the honeybee,

And live alone in the bee-loud glade.

And I shall have some peace there, for peace comes dropping slow,

Dropping from the veils of the morning to where the cricket sings;

There midnight's all a glimmer, and noon a purple glow,

And evening full of the linnet's wings.

I will arise and go now, for always night and day

I hear lake water lapping with low sounds by the shore;

While I stand on the roadway, or on the pavements grey,

I hear it in the deep heart's core.

Update on Sweet potato growing Trial in Ireland.

Update

Novemeber 2010.

We harvested the Sweet Potato in late October and yield per plant averaged 1.5 kg but on the good rows we got up to 2 Kg on some plants. As we planted on the flat we reduced yield per plant so next seasons plants will definitely go into drills. this season we were not able to drill the particular site. Next years trial has already been decided on and ill be 3 times bigger with a total of 4 very different varieties three of which are totally new to cultivation. These are pictures from from this years harvesting.

Progress of our Sweet Potato Trial.

Planted on 17th of May the first to my knowledge serious scaled production of Sweet Potato here in Ireland is making great progress. The purpose of the trial is to establish what yield and commercial value this crop can have for organic greenhouse production. As you see in this picture the crop was planted as very small two leaf cuttings. See earlier blog post.

http://fitzgeraldnurseries.blogspot.com/2010/05/sweet-potato-planting-for-2010.html

By early June this is how the crop looked.

In mid June I then applied biological control for insects. All weeding was done by hand, flame burner and hoe until the crop fully covered the soil.

This is a picture taken of the crop on 23rd of July, well on the way to being a bumper crop. The strong performance of the crop leads me to believe it should be possible to grow a successful crop in Ireland using "Spanish Tunnels" until end of July. Then leave uncovered until harvest. Already I am planning to make this the subject of a 2011 trial.

More on this crop when we harvest in late September.

We are ahead of the trend curve on this Check out these articles.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB119560675497599936.html

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704691304575254771704417714.html

http://topics.nytimes.com/top/news/health/series/recipes_for_health/sweet_potatoes/index.html

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/11/25/us/25sweet.html

Urban Oasis at Bloom in the Park 2010

Urban Oasis Garden at Bloom in the Park 2010

http://www.myplant.ie/ http://bloominthepark.com/engagingspaces/

The Urban Oasis

Choice and theme of plants form an integral part of all gardens from the most minimalist Japanese designs to the riotous flower colour of the Victorian perennial border. This year at Bloom in the Park 2010 three professionals from the gardening world from Northern Ireland and Republic of Ireland have come together to pool their years of gardening, artistic and architectural talent into an Urban Oasis which I hope you will agree brings a new outlook on plants in the urban living space.
The plants of Urban Oasis were selected by Designer Dawn Aston predominantly with foliage as a major and crucial consideration. Over the last 10 years I have travelled all over the world both physically and virtually in seek of sustainable foliage colour for the garden and garden containers. Out of this search and foliage lust we have developed a business at FitzGerald Nurseries and MyPlant® which focuses singularly on foliage but should the plant have great seasonal flowering this is of course an important bonus. For what seems forever flower has dominated the visual reporting and public ohh and ahhh of garden shows while foliage sits in the background very evident and giving perfect foil, contrast and sustenance to flower. As a nurseryman it has been a fantastic opportunity to work with Dawn Aston and Crawford Leitch who just like the foliage to the flower give talented and inspired environment for human and plant to interact. I had always wanted to participate in such a project and thanks to Dawn and Crawford for coming up with this wonderful environment giving MyPlant’s this wonderful Urban Garden environment.

The Plants of Urban Oasis.
In 2008 I launched MyPlant® as a brand to represent a range of easy to grow garden plants for small gardens, the concept of such a range was awarded Press Prize at one of the worlds most important professional nursery shows Plantarium. Plantarium is held in Boskoop Netherlands the heart of European garden plant production so this was a great honour. http://www.myplant.ie/news.php?n_id=33

Now in 2010 thanks to this opportunity with Urban Oasis the plants can speak for themselves and show their value in this style of environment I first envisaged the collection would be used in. I hope this information gives you some idea to the background and people behind the introduction of each key plant and its origin. Behind most good garden plants lays a story of search, discovery or breeding. In addition to this work production development must be undertaken to bring this new life form to the world at large. Breeders and selectors must ensure any new plant introduction has some uniquely distinguishable attribute that makes it worth all the fuss. I feel we have chosen plants for this wonderful Urban Oasis which are just that. The following paragraphs will try to give a brief history of these wonderful plants. For more detailed information on the plants you can see http://www.myplant.ie/ .

Key feature plants.

Carex oshimensis Evergreen is similar to the species form of the Oshima sedge from Japan with wonderful simple brown tipped abundances of flower in Spring. Later we will see more selections of the Oshima sedge which I have made over the last few years and are now FitzGerald Nurseries most popular exported plant. Almost 1 million Carex plants will be produced by us in 2010. Evergreen provides a simple natural and relaxing under planting or feature plant in containers and this from was selected for its more compact growth and depth of colour.

Libertia ixiodes Goldfinger selected at Naturally Native Nurseries in New Zealand and marketed in Europe by Plantipp Netherlands on behalf of New Zealand’s Lyndale Nurseries Kiwi Gold native New Zealand plant collection. When I first saw this new Libertia variety on a trip to New Zealand in 2003 I knew immediately it was a must have. Goldfinger sets the gold vein for Dawns artistic theme in Urban Oasis and Crawford in his design catches this with some well positioned gold and mineral finishes in the structure of the garden. Libertia Goldfinger is one of my favourite introductions and is ideal for containers in the colder regions and mass planting in coastal and milder parts. Goldfinger will tolerate temperatures of -5 C to -7 C but below these temperatures will need protection with heavy fleece covering. This fantastic plant has white flowers in May and the foliage colour changes from butter yellow to old gold as temperatures decrease through Autumn and Winter. There is no plant like Goldfinger and it lives up to its iconic name all plants of Goldfinger like all the other plants in Urban Oasis are produced here in Ireland, exported throughout Europe and many other countries worldwide. I am proud to be associated with this wonderful plant and deligted it gets pride of place in the garden

Carex trifida Rekohu Sunrise is Another representative from New Zealand’s native flora. This is the first introduction from the trifida species of Carex and in New Zealand is commonly known as Muttonbird Sedge due to the flowers resembling the feet of the native Muttonbird. Rekohu Sunrise was bred by Mr Terry Hatch of Joy Nurseries in New Zealand, During this harsh and prolonged cold spell of January 2010 I found this plant to be even hardier than first thought and is a wonderful addition to the urban landscape palette. Rekohu Sunrise can be cut right back to tidy it up in March / early April and will produce vigorous but compact shoots of wonderful bright foliage take a close look at the flower of this plant as you walk through the Urban Oasis its most unusual in detail.

Ophiopogon nigrascens and its other mondo grass relatives are some of hardiest, functionally attractive and most versatile dwarf ground cover plants available. Slow growing ground hugging and with wonderful detail in flower and berry what more can one ask from a plant but there is more. Ophiopogon nigrascens is drought tolerant, will grow in shade semi shade and full sun and is hardy to at least -15 C what more can I say? This Japanese native provides attractive ground cover in the garden but look closely and you will see the developing lilac coloured flower spikes which on mature plants set attractive black berries. Well I have a hidden treasure surprise for you! I can say more because three years ago I received an improved variety of this wonderful plant and its called Blackbeard. Since then we have been exclusively working to produce this plant in the MyPlant laboratory to distribute to nurseries worldwide and now I can tell you more! Ophiopogon nigrascens Blackbeard will be available to the gardening public for the first time ever in limited numbers as 9cm pots here at Bloom in the Floral Marquee! Blackbeard was bred by my friend and wonderful plants man Steve Yandell from Penzance (where else would a good pirate come from). Steve selected Blackbeard for its faster growth, longer leaves and more clumping habit. This is what plant breeders do and Steve has added immensely to the value of this the blackest foliage plant on earth suitable for garden use. Dawn has made appropriate and use of Ophiopogon nigrascens in her Urban Oasis.

Canna Tropicanna is a wonderful Tropical perennial plant introduced by Mr Keith Kirsten from South Africa named and marketed around the world by Anthony Tesselaar International. Tropicanna has led to two other varieties now introduced and featuring in Urban Oasis Tropicanna Black and Tropicanna Gold making a wonderful collection of this colourful and exotic plant. Like all of the plants in Urban Oasis you can read more about Tropicanna on http://www.myplant.ie/ Canna Generally has a reputation for being difficult to grow by some people. Over the last 5 years I have been involved in a project to make growing these Canna varieties much easier. I am pleased to say that from work done by our nursey and plant laboratory we now have young vigorous plants which are easy to grow. As Canna is a tropical plant one can easily be put off in cold damp Ireland but I assure you with the same care as you would give Dahlia, Tropicanna can be a wonderful addition to the small garden and should not be ignored for those of us with foliage colour lust. Tropicanna also has spectacular flowering.

Royal Hawaiian Colocasia Collection. You haven’t heard of this series before? This is because its another surprise in the Urban Oasis and another first. These Colocasia are again like Tropicanna tropical plants in the Urban Oasis garden and yet another first time display treat for Irish gardeners looking for something special. Royal Hawaiian Colocasia can be seen in more detail on this website http://www.royalhawaiiancolocasias.com/ and I am sure will decorate future gardens conservatories and patios. They go on sale in Europe generally in Spring early Summer 2011. In the mean time we have some baby plants available at the MyPlant® display in the Floral Marquee for you experienced gardeners who want to try them out in your conservatory or greenhouse and plant them out in 2011 to be ahead of the rest of Europe with this wonderful collection. The sensational collection comes from an internationally acclaimed breeder Dr John J Cho who has achieved outstanding success with his new line of ornamental Colocasias.

Cordyline australis Karo Kiri is a most unusual variety of the common Cordyline we see all over Ireland in our coastal towns and cites. Unlike its species form Karo Kiri is an easily maintained dwarf form which can be cut back to make what you see in The Urban Oasis at Bloom in the Park. Just try it yourself is my only way to describe this plant, you will either love it or leave it. For me it is an exciting option in Cordyline and is versatile in containers or small gardens. Now you can have what looks like a mature muti-branched New Zealand Cabbage Tree but perfectly at home on even a small balcony. Guess what, yes this is another first for the MyPlant Collection and comes from New Zealand breeder and selector Ross Baybliss and now finally after many years of production work we can bring this plant to the European garden plant scene.

Carex oshimensis Everest is another from my breeding work on the Oshima sedge. I have been growing Carex for 20 years now and having been bought stock of the well known Carex Evergold as a birthday present (another long story) the year I set up FitzGerald Nurseries. We are now possibly the largest producer of Carex oshimensis in the world and export many hundreds of thousands worldwide. Carex oshimensis just loves our Irish climate and is a versatile plant for the garden or containers. It is sometimes unfortunately misunderstood and misused leading to unsightly clumps in exposed and sodden landscapes but more about that another time. Everest is ideally suited to sheltered urban gardens, will thrive in semi shade situations and in containers giving the most wonderful white margins seen on any plant. Dawn uses Everest as a total blanket ground cover. Check it out for yourself and use in containers or small garden borders. Everest was picked as an entrant in the recent American Idols plant competition in USA and won a Silver medal at Plantarium in Boskoop Netherlands.

Carex oshimensis Everillo was first launched at the wonderful Hillsborough Show in Northern Ireland earlier in May. Everillo is a wonderfully cheerful addition to the garden only just discovered in 2008. We are now building up the numbers as limited availability launch in Ireland then full worldwide release Spring 2012. This is how long it takes even a relatively fast to produce plant such as Everillo. Take a look at Everillo in the head containers in Urban Oasis I think its a fantastic addition for shade and semi shade I hope you agree! Remember this plant is a Japanese native bred for its colour right here in Ireland and like many of the plants in Urban Oasis is not to be seen in any garden except Urban Oasis.

Phormium cookianum Black Adder is another selection from FitzGerald Nurseries and now sold internationally by us to as far away as Japan, Australia, its native New Zealand USA and most European countries. Black Adder selected by me over 6 years ago has been a wonderful success story and adopted by many nurseries including leading New Zealand Nursery Lyndale Nurseries as the number one black / purple Phormium. To be accepted in its homeland as such is accolade enough for me to be proud to present Black Adder in an Urban Oasis. You can find plenty of information on how Black Adder is spreading across the world if you Google Phormium Black Adder. Its amazing how this plant has spread around the world with almost all the production coming from Ireland as tiny baby plants to be grown in local markets to planting maturity. Black Adder won best container plant award for FitzGerald Nurseries at the worlds largest professional Horticulture Show IPM Essen Germany in 2008.

Yucca gloriosa Bright Star is another winner for FitzGerald Nurseries at IPM Essen 2009 and first prize for best patio container plant was presented to FitzGerald Nurseries by Germany’s Federal Agriculture Minister Ilse Aigner. Bright Star was discovered at Walberton Nursery West Sussex England by Mr Tim Crowther, promoted by Plants For Europe and introduced into production in Europe by FitzGerald Nurseries. Bright Star is an outstanding colour selection of the hardy and drought tolerant Yucca gloriosa. This plant is a wonderful foliage and flower addition to the Urban Oasis garden or any garden looking for that glow of colour during the dull winter months. A wonderful additional feature of Bright Star is its pink colouring which comes during drought or cold weather conditions.

Cordyline fruticosa Caruba Black is a tropical Cordyline from Anthony Tesselaar and produced exclusively in Europe by FitzGerald Nurseries. Unlike its more hardy cousin C. australis Caruba Black needs temperatures over 3 C to maintain its attractive appearance and colour so must only be used as a Summer dot plant to give a tropical exotic look to borders or containers. During the Winter months Caruba Black makes a fantastic addition to conservatory containers and can even be cut back the following spring to encourage multiple stems.


I hope you get time to see all these and more in Urban Oasis at Bloom 2010. Visit Stand N13 in the Floral Marquee to take home some of our plants to begin your own personal Oasis.

Pat FitzGerald
MyPlant
by
FitzGerald Nurseries.

Twelve months of Social media

I have been trying for weeks to get a short post done to give my experience of using social media. The purpose of me looking at social media was for information gathering, promotion of my business and to learn how people around the world are using plants. I hoped also to generally understand trends and broaden my knowlege of day to day horticulture in other countries. This at least was my original motivation. So here is my post its not professionally written , its just my ramblings and in no way meant to be a tutorial so feel free to tell me where I am wrong please.

Gone are the days when the phone is your fastest and only sales tool.

Background

Over the last ten years I have worked to develop our business from predominantly a Ireland UK sales based business to now selling our plants in 18 countries.
During these years I have been developing selecting and breeding some great plants to bring into our nursery business. In addition to these plants I am lucky enough to have some fantastic friends and colleagues in the industry around the world. Having great plants growing them well bulding all the resources we have built in the business has taken a lot of stress time energy and cost. As we all know working ones butt off doing ones best and what one feels is the right thing doesnt always feel good while observing the mayhem and ridiculous behavoir of established wiseguys and so called establishment over the last number of years. All of us in the horticulture world who try to make a living from it must compete with these pretty slick industries selling profitible non perisable products giving sometimes short lived instant but obvious gratification. Of course ours is not the only industry producing great products and not all products with very big marketing budgets are bad. So we have serious competiton for that dollar or euro. Year by year over the decades the bar has risen higher and its become more difficult for small businesses to access publicity and advertizing as good advertizing became more and more expensive.

So how on earth is some guy in the middle of nowhere Ireland going to tell people about these great plants. Now that we have done all the work getting them into production and physically out to far flung places such as Fresno and Watsonville California Angers in France various places in UK Germany Holland Japan Australia etc to be produced locally. Well the short answer is that we just had to hope it happened that people liked the plants and found out about them thorough some of the great people we deal with. Like our nursery these nurseries have to grow lots of varieties these days to stay in business and provide variety for the customer. Its not fair to expect our customers to be thinking of our plants every day. Advertizing isnt a possibility we simply right now dont have the budget for this but its chicken and egg, if we dont make the sales we will never have the budget. We have already spent money in our established markets on advertizing but no way can we do it in countries where we have no sales already as our industry does not give us that much profit that quickly and plants for some reason are not valued for longevity. Ahem maybe a pay by view system? In additon to these issues how do we know we are offereing what people in these countries like or want without a big budget to do market surveys using professional firms. For a small business like ours we just have to do our trade shows, try to put budgets aside for advertizing and hope for the best. In 2008 I travelled from San Diego to Bellingham Washington doing 2008 Pack trials on the way. I learned a lot but I didnt meet any of the retailers, landscape designers or got to chew over what they like or dislike with the very people who might use my plants. Well I guess this is why big companies get bigger and small companies take a lot of time unless they get some lucky breaks noting wrong with that we just got to work harder at it.

While reading the Sunday Business Post newspaper in January 2009 I saw an article about Social media. It described Twitter, Facebook, blogging and a few other platforms. I logged online took a look and reckoned yep it's for people with plenty of time on their hands who like to talk about what they ate for breakfast and liked to say 'yay' a lot. However being a nosey git I still signed up for Twitter account 'cos its free' I cant remember exact date but around the end of January 2009. Over the following weeks and months I checked in on it regularly looked at what was going on used it to post up pictures after a while. The main thing was information and seeing what others were doing. I found Facebook and did the same, started a blog connected them all together as its very simple and no course needed but in hindsight a course probably would have saved a lot of time. I already had http://www.fitzgerald-nurseries.com/ and our brand website http://www.myplant.ie/ so at least there was some window people could look into to see what we do.
I have to say without intent to portray it as a virtue, Horticulture is more than a business to me, to put it simply, I like what I do when I am working and that is not nescessarily a virtue. This is an important point when interacting with people in horticulture as I believe most other people in the horticulture business are the same. Myself my wife Noirin and all our nursery and laboratory staff do really good work and thats what I tweet about and put up on Facebook. Its real its honest and its good so why hide it and its not as if millions are interested anyway but some like what we do and like our plants. As owner of the business I have responsiblility to the 35 staff we have and if I dont promote our plants every day then who will! So it was not so much a optional choice but a responsibility to use this medium where the alternatives were not an option.

So what is this stuff about. Two heads are better than one or do we need five?

Not having had marketing training i know one thing is certain. I am making hundreds of mistakes and possibly wasting a lot of time doing things on the cheap and the hard way. For me social media is about being 'sociable' like the local pub or golf course where you get to chat sometimes sort out problems or tell someone youre looking for a second hand forklift, or I need to find someone to landscape the garden or that guy I got the second hand forklift wouldnt know a donkeys tail from a Toyota so dont go near him or other such gems of wisdom. There is no point in trying to manipulate or be selfish with our actions just the same as it isnt good to use your friends without being available to give back if needed or if you see the opportunity without any obligation! If I do do that its by accident so I apologise in advance if thats not believed then I am doing something very wrong. Most of us dont expect anything back when we do a favour and like all giving it can feel better for the giver than the receiver. There are life long givers who simply love doing good are superhuman and are impossible to return kindness to in kind. I dont like to dwell on this part of the whole social media thing as it should be simply common sense to us all and its not measureable in any case as to some a small gesture is gold. I feel its just right to be concious and prepared to share, if you cant invest the time in interacting in this spirit then think about another way of telling people about your work or products.

Keeping up to date with all the tweets, posts and updates is not always easy brrrrrrrrr it makes me dizzy a lot of the time and in fact its impossible. This time of year for me its especially very hard to spend time checking out trends, whats happening and telling people about our business, pushing out other peoples information, shouting out what we are doing and what plants are going out now. This is where the iPhone came in it is in my opinion revoloutionary, some times on Sundays I take pictures of articles in the newspaper Tweet them or email them. This picture below from the farmers journal was just fun didnt take but a click and a tweet. Once I started using the IPhone in July 09 it became so easy to share stuff and thats simply what I do on Twtitter and facebook. Using IPhone I can upload visideso so go to here if tou want to know what I do there. http://www.facebook.com/patrickjosephfitzgerald?ref=profile Its not rocket science.

Over the months that followed using Twitter, Blogger and Facebook, things started happening. There are some amazing people on my Twitter followers list and they know who they are. Without singling out anyone I can assure you there are some very generous and good spirited people with genuine good will. This is my Twitter profile http://twitter.com/PatFitzGerald I want to take this opportunity to thank them all for the last 12 months education. I am a bit hit and miss at times right now but the gardening, designer and nursery community on Twitter and Facebook are exceptional and know no borders in the continent of Social Media. You can see some of their generous posts here.

http://thelivengoodway.blogspot.com/2009/08/ballad-of-patrick-fitzgerald.html
http://gossipinthegarden.com/2009/09/07/the-adventures-of-black-adder-tuxedo/
http://lifeonthebalcony.com/gardening-in-the-internet-era/
http://www.soenyun.com/Blog/2009/05/04/some-garden-ceanothus/
http://spreadfarthefame.com/2009/09/17/the-many-faces-of-pat-fitzgerald-2/
http://www.anniesannuals.com/plants/plant_display.asp?prodid=3184
http://mygarden.rhs.org.uk/blogs/graham_rice/archive/2010/02/28/ceanothus-tuxedo-the-first-black-leaved-ceanothus.aspx
http://westsoundgardener.pattisplants.com/2010/03/04/the-beautiful-black-leaved-tuxedo%C2%AE-ceanothus/

Summary.

Can I tell you what has been acheived to date for the business from my social media efforts. I cannot tell. Yet! I do know many hundreds of good horticulture people know more about our plants and our business than could ever have been possible.

Has this added to our bottom line? I havent a clue, right now we are having a very good sales season but cant tell if this would have been the case anyhow and has more to do with the hard work of staff and the things that have to be in a business with or without social media. I have not figured out a way for people to pay us just for a picture, tweet of our plants or talking about them :-).

Am I glad I use social medai as a buiness tool? Yes.

Do I feel it is a worthwhile investment in time? Yes but I probably should have done more formal training and analysis and maybe I will.

What advice would I give to someone new to social media trying to use it for their business? Keep the day job! Dont listen to me talk to a professional! The product must be the key and unless youre some real Einstien nobody is probably going to pay you for your opinions, most of the old rules apply. At least thats what I think.

Its a whole new area, I am not sure even the gurus know what they are talking about but I suspect its not such a new phenomenon just more public. The Sandwich board man or the guy holding the arrow to a shop down a back street or the blimp may be just simplified versions of social media.

Maybe if you just make a good product people will seek you out. However these days there are lots of people making products just as good as yours or on the high street making lesser products but much more accessible or better known and trusted. Tune in next year and if I am around I might know more.

End

Sweet Potato Planting 2010

Sweet Potato Planting 2010.

Kildalton College of Horticulture, Piltown Co, Kilkenny.

After our successful trial of Sweet Potato at Kildalton College in 2009 organised by Mr Jim Kelliher Senior Nursery Advisor with Teagasc we have gone back for a much larger trial this year. Unfortunately this time Jim was not with us to do the planting. I am very sure however Jim will be with us to harvest the resulting crop and myself and Dermot Callaghan on left in the picture here look forward to this event. Without the input and drive of Jim the 2010 trials on sweet potato growing would not have gone ahead. I wish to take this opportunity to thank Jim for getting the trials to this stage.

Today we planted 5 rows at 1 metre centres with 30 cm between plants so 400 plants in total have gone into the trial. This trial will give us a fair indication of the value and return from Sweet potato growing in greenhouse conditions in Ireland. The purpose of this further trial is to asses the viability of this crop commercially and promote this wonderful healthy vegetable as an alternative commercial crop for organic and amateur gardeners. This crop will be grown using organic methods therefore no fungicides, insecticides or herbicides will be used in the production. The trial will continue until September / October 2010 at which point we hope to harvest a wonderful crop of sweet potato. In addition to my last blog piece please see here information on our trial in 2009 http://fitzgeraldnurseries.blogspot.com/2009/10/sweet-success.html
During the planting I overheard a student in the greenhouse next door say something about the first time he came into the greenhouse. This sparked my memory back to when I came into the greenhouse as a student at Kildalton. I suddenly realized to my shock, it had been almost exactly 30 years since I first set foot in this greenhouse. Michael Minihan RIP and Michael Conlon RIP were part of the lecurer team there at the time, both wonderful guys but both sadly passed away before their time. The glasshouse where so many hundreds of students have learned their first lessons in Horticulture took on a slightly different meaning bringing memories and echos of past afternoons into the mix of humans and plants. Myself and Dermot "perspried" in the heat of the greenhouse on a wonderful May day. I couldnt help remebering 30 yr old trickling beads of sweat on Michael Minihans red complexion as he tried to explain some salient Chrysanthemum growing tip. During that period in the early eighties it seems to me there was more experimentation hope and expectation from horticulture even though the economy was even worse than it is today. Hopefully the powers that fund Horticulture in Ireland can take a step back and ask should we have drifted away. Maybe we can go some way back to those times and invest more in the real skills of Horticulture and plant science which have serious economic and social values that may have been forgottten for a while. I do believe we have lost some of our hunger and drive from those times and we need to direct resources back towards skills like Horticulture before it becomes more difficult to do so.
Finally back to the sweet potato. Just as myself and Dermot had finished planting the very last cutting Mr Jim Mahoney Head of Horticulture with Teagasc dropped in. Jim on left with Mr Brian Lyons Glasshouse section Manager at Kildalton as you can imagine was dissapointed having missed helping with the planting. We however were delighted to assure Jim that we will not forget him when the spuds need to be harvested in the Autumn. We expect to have plenty of help on hand for that occasion when the proof of the pudding will be in the eating!

Nurserymans Tip to Growing Sweet Potato

Nurseryman's Tip

Sweet Potato.

Full Name: Ipomoea batatas ‘Beauregard’
Leaf: Heart shaped, green
Preferred Location: In the soil/big growing containers
Likes: Well drained, sandy soil/Full sun
Dislikes: Over watering and temperatures below 5°C

Sweet potatoes are becoming increasingly popular as part of a healthy diet in Europe. Home
production of Sweet potato can be done in big plastic containers, on the patio and therefore
makes the crop available for a wider range of gardeners. This crop is especially interesting for
younger people or those without a large garden who want to grow something special. Anyone who has traveled to countries like USA, Australia, Middle East and many of the Pacific Islands where Sweet potato is a common vegetable. The dietary and health advantages of Sweet potato are now well recognised and Sweet Potato is commonly recommended by dieticians for very young babies beginning their solid food diets.

In 2009 I posted this blog piece showing ourtrials on Sweet Potato. You can see this post here http://fitzgeraldnurseries.blogspot.com/2009/10/sweet-success.html

I have put together the following detailed tips for your information in growing and storing your own SweetPotato this year.

Growing instructions
- Optimum of 4 - 5 months of continuous growing between 10°C night and 30°C day required
- ‘tuber’ growth starts during the shortening days
- Well draining, sandy soils, pH 6 to 6.5, minimum 20 to 30 cm deep
- Planting of the rooted cuttings in rows 1 m apart, 30 cm within the
rows or in individual growing containers
- Water in when planting the rooted cuttings, but overwatering during
the growing period can cause root damage
- Requires less fertilizer than most vegetable crops so do not overfeed
- Keep weed free during growing
- Relatively free of pest and disease problems, but can have root rots caused
by cold and wet soil conditions
- Harvest in dry weather where possible
- Harvest before the first frost and with care as sweet potatoes are sensitive to bruising
- Store the roots by over 25 °C and a minimum relative humidity of 90% for 2 weeks to heal
the wounds, reduce weight loss and convert the starches into sugars
- Savour the Sweet potatoes boiled, mashed or fried accompanied by a nice glass of chilled white wine

Nutrition information
Sweet potatoes are :
- fat-free and cholesterol-free
- have only 130 calories per serving (one medium
potato)
- are a good source of fibre – 3.9 grams
- are an excellent source of:
Vitamin A – 7860 IU/serving
Vitamin C – 29.51 mg/serving
Potassium – 265.2 mg/serving
Calcium – 28.6 mg/serving
Iron – 0.79 mg/serving
Folate – 18.2 mcg/serving

Special notes on harvesting & storage of sweet potato.

It is desireable to leave your crop of Sweet Potato for as long as possible before digging out. The top growth will not die back like the normal potato unless it is hit by frost. I recommend you target to harvest some time end of September if growing out door and mid October if growing in a greenhouse. It is important that they be harvested befroe grond temperatures go too low and certainly before any early frosts.
When harvesting Sweet Potato it is desireable to have dry soil conditions. If this isnt possible take special care to lay the roots out in a dry warm location. Sweet Potato have a very thin skin so care should be taken not to bruise or cut the skin surface as this can lead to rots during storage or curing the potatoes.

Curing.

For best it is desireable to cure sweet potato after harvest. Curing brings out the best in flavour. Proper curing has been shown to increase the sensation of moistness and sweetness, enhance the aroma, and decrease starch content while increasing sugars. Curing also drys up any skin damage and prevents rots in storage. Curing also helps harden or set the skin which helps prolong storage. An idea temperature for curing is between 25 C and 29 C with humidity of 85% which helps avoid weight loss.

Storage.

Ideally cure the tubers for at least a week you can then store the tubers between 10 Celcius to 13 Celcius for over 6 months. Ensure the tubers are stored at a reasonable humidity 80% to 85% is perfect but good air circulation should be maintained by storing in layers. Do not the potatoes storage environment to become excessively dry or weight loss can occur. It is also important not to allow storage temperatures rise too high as sprouting will begin at about 15 Celcius or 16 Celcius.