Looking at some of the prices I realised just how much a person could spend if tempted to buy some of the new things that have been developed.
(All pictures from The Marshalls May Catalogue and website, and they are not paying me to mention them ...unfortunately!)
White Blackberries £19.98 for 3 plants
My thought "Why white blackberries?
A large supposedly extra prolific Blueberry
£12.99 for one plant
To go with the white blackberry you could have a black raspberry
That's another £9.99They've come up with a type of Rhubarb that doesn't go dormant in the summer
Rhubarb Livingstone £14.99A standard Gooseberry so you don't have to bend to pick them
That will be £22.99 pleaseAnd that's just for starters.
Then there is a lemon tree for £19.99 but it is between 3 and 4 foot tall which is probably more likely to produce fruit sooner than my lemon "tree" which came as an extra for £2.99 when I bought other things from some random garden catalogue earlier this year.
Back Soon
Sue
( Edited in to say that because some people had problems reading my blog because adding a Wordpress blog belonging to my penfriend onto my reading list somehow pushed my blog to a strip down the side, must be something to do with her picture. So apologies D I've had to take your blog off the side)
Perhaps the white blackberry is for those discerning folks who dislike purple fingers after foraging! Why has you blog gone so errr slim? It slithers down the left hand side of my screen and I have to grab it and pull the poor thing about to make it bigger. x
ReplyDeleteI have to admit I ell for a pink blueberry - and will have to wait until next year to find whether they're nice or not!
ReplyDeleteJ x
Really don't fancy white blackberries. Did you see they were selling tiger nut plants? I was seriously thinking of sending for one just for the experience. I remember them from my childhood.
ReplyDeleteI like my fruit the colours they have always been. As for your lemon tree, mine is a bit bigger, grew it from a pip, I can wait for the fruit, it's about the nourishment and getting to the fruiting stage. I do like to try and get things from seeds.
ReplyDeleteI'm afraid I too like fruit and veg the convential colours. My husband has been buying, not deliberately, peaches which are white-ish inside instead of the usual yellow and I won't eat them. I feel that the seeds have been 'tampered' with.
ReplyDeleteI have grown a plum tree from a stone, about two foot high now and I expect it will be quite a while before it fruits, if ever. I just wanted to prove that I can do it.
Joan (Wales)
I grew up in Australia where the peaches were usually white inside. I found yellow peaches very odd when I lived in England for a time :-) Now you can get both quite easily in Oz
DeleteYikes. That does sound expensive. I honestly don't like the look of those white berries. They don't look that appealing.
ReplyDeleteThere is no substitute for freshly picked fruit and vegetables, but sometimes. when you see the prices of things, it does make you wonder whether it is worth the hard work.
ReplyDeletethat is the trouble with the catalogues. So many temptations!
ReplyDeleteYour lemon tree will do brilliantly well, because you are a rather good gardener!
x
The white blackberries look awful!
ReplyDeleteI really like sitting down to a coffee and reading a fruit and veggie catalogue. I get a Japanese one from California, that I just love reading.
ReplyDeletecheers, parsnip
I enjoy going thru those type catalogues myself but don't I buy from them. I bought a small lilac plant for $7.50 the other week. It's in a bigger pot now and maybe next year it will bloom. I like smaller sized ones to grow myself. Next size up too frostbitten for me to buy for $17. Budget!! I was wondering what was going on with big photo to side of your blog. Take care!
ReplyDeleteI enjoy going thru those type catalogues myself but don't I buy from them. I bought a small lilac plant for $7.50 the other week. It's in a bigger pot now and maybe next year it will bloom. I like smaller sized ones to grow myself. Next size up too frostbitten for me to buy for $17. Budget!! I was wondering what was going on with big photo to side of your blog. Take care!
ReplyDeleteI love catalogue but I never buy from them. I'd worry I'd kill something I've spent too much money on. I fell in love with a wisteria in a garden centre, it was stunning and £100, hubby kept saying treat yourself but I just couldn't.
ReplyDeleteI've never heard of white blackberries - don't think I'd buy any either. It would certainly cost a pretty penny if you bought everything you've listed, I had no idea fruit and veg plants were so expensive. My nanna had rhubarb growing in her garden when I was little and she couldn't give it away. She's be aghast at paying £14.99 for a plant.
ReplyDeleteHope Col is doing OK on the tablets and will be home with you soon. xx
(you have a double column on the sidebar, which is making it very tight. North Stoke has Saturday spelt down the column a letter at a time.
ReplyDeleteMaybe change to a single column? Or no images there?)
We used to have white mulberries too - tasted just as good.
ReplyDeleteI went to a nursery a few weeks ago and just about had a heart attack looking at the prices! When did plants become so expensive?
ReplyDeleteI suppose the white blackberries are a novelty, but I wouldn't bother with them, that's for sure, I just walk along the lanes here, or across Next Door's fields (I know where all the big juicy ones grow). There are few more pleasant ways of spending a restful afternoon in late summer. Black raspberries - well, they do look a good size, but again I wouldn't bother. As for summer long rhubarb - I think half the pleasure would go if you could eat it all summer. Everything in its season.
ReplyDeleteI went into Wyevale for seeds recently (can't afford to buy anything else in there!) and I was horrified by the price of the plants. Even bedding plants - 6 for £12 in some cases (Geraniums I think). Other things were two or even three times the price you would find them elsewhere. The elderly couple in front of me had paid I think £7 or £8.99 for ONE broad bean plant, well grown. You might just as well just go and buy the broad beans from the shop at that price - you'd get a few pounds for the same money. Rip off merchants.
I try and buy what bedding plants I need at car boot sales, and also all my tomato plants as I can't start them early here as I just have my summer plastic greenhouse. So tomatoes and cucumbers come as seedlings, and most other things I grow from seed. Courgette plants anyone?!
I'm glad I'm not the only one that dislikes paying through the nose for older plants, anyway I find they don't fruit any quicker as they object to being transplanted.
ReplyDeleteI also like my food to be the colour it is supposed to be ... black blackberries, red raspberries, dark beetroots ... and I do prefer my carrots orange even though I know some of the oldest heritage ones are black or white.
My husband was given a Meyer lemon tree after surgery last year. We re potted it and it bloomed profusely. Now eleven months later it has two almost full grown lemons, and several smaller ones from a recent blooming. We cant put it outside except in the summer months but hope to keep it growing.
ReplyDelete