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Colorado Blue Spruce Seed
Picea pungens glaucaPrice range: £5.00 through £18.00 inc. VATColorado Blue Spruce has needles leaves that tend to turn green with age; so those at the base of branches are green, resulting in an attractive variation of colour down the branch. It is architectural in form. If grown in a pot it is good for bringing into the house as a Christmas tree for a short while (cool room preferred!) Care free, since pruning would spoil it’s even shape.
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Colorado White Fir Seed
Abies concolorPrice range: £5.00 through £13.00 inc. VATColorado White Fir is a widely grown conifer with grey needles up to 6cm long. It is a beautiful large tree with grey bark and long cylindrical cones. The wood it produces is soft and non resinous, with a good ability to hold nails(!?) which makes it an important timber tree.
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Common / English Yew Seed
Taxus baccata£5.00 inc. VATYew is a small to medium sized tree with fruits that are a bright red aril, which contrasts superbly with the dark green foliage. The fruit is eaten by birds but is poisonous to people. Yew is tolerant of most soils and is often found on chalk formations in the wild. Very ancient ones are found in Churchyards all over the country – it was once held in great esteem by Druids and mystics.
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Common Green Beech Seed
Fagus sylvatica£5.00 inc. VATBeech is a versatile, majestic tree with a smooth silver grey bark. New spring leaves are a superb lime green and in autumn they turn a rich copper gold colour. It makes an excellent specimen tree or an outstanding hedge, especially since the old, crisp brown (marcescent) leaves stay on the hedge until the spring. Pollution tolerant, it will cope with exposed and cold sites but will not grow in coastal areas.
Not for forestry purposes.
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Common Ivy Seed
Hedera helix£3.50 inc. VATCommon Ivy is adaptable and makes an excellent ground cover plant as well as being a good climber. Its evergreen leaves offer all year round green cover, and as such is used as a shelter and nesting site for small birds and insects. The scented spherical flower-heads offer a good source of nectar/pollen for late autumn flying insects and the blue-black berries are eaten through the late autumn and early winter by birds.
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Common Walnut Seed
Juglans regiaPrice range: £5.00 through £9.50 inc. VATCommon Walnut is a slow growing medium sized tree with a rounded head, and it is not very common! It’s deciduous leaves have lots of leaflets a bit like Ash, but bigger. It produces very valuable wood and the walnut nut. For pickled walnut, the aromatic fruit need to be collected in late June before the inner shell is formed, and whilst the fleshy outer part is green and quite soft. Myths abound about Walnut which is supposed to be The Witches’ Tree, maybe because the branches look sturdy but are, in fact, hollow. Beating the trunk in the winter with sticks is rumoured to increase the walnut crop!
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Copper Beech Seed
Fagus sylvatica atropurpureum£5.00 inc. VATThe Copper Beech is an outstandingly beautiful deciduous tree. This deep purple leaved form of beech is usually grown from seed. The purple plants are then selected from the 50% that show the purple form. Can be trimmed to form a superb neat hedge. It keeps the crisp dead leaves on the branches until new leaves start to appear in the spring. The copper-brown coloured seeds are encased in hard prickly ‘masts’ Quite shallow rooted, so best to be grown where not exposed to high winds.
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Cordyline Seed
Cordyline australisPrice range: £5.00 through £8.00 inc. VATCordylines or New Zealand Cabbage trees grow into small evergreen trees with a single trunk topped with a dense mass of long sword like leaves. Small creamy white flowers in large terminal panicles are produced in early summer. A very striking architectural plant.
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Corkbark Fir Seed
Abies lasiocarpaPrice range: £5.00 through £13.00 inc. VATCork Bark Fir is a very ornamental conifer which is relatively rare in its native area. It has attractive densely arranged, blue-green needles. The bark on mature trees becomes deeply furrowed and corky. This tree is extremely hardy, growing near the tree-line in Arizona and New Mexico. It tolerates near alpine conditions, but is a real asset to a smaller garden since it is slow growing.
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Cornelian Cherry Seed
Cornus mas£5.00 inc. VATCornelian cherry is a large shrub or small densely branched deciduous tree. It produces a profusion of small yellow flowers on leafless twigs in late winter which result in red, cherry like fruits. The leaves turn reddish purple in autumn.
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Corsican Pine Seed
Pinus nigra corsicanaPrice range: £8.00 through £26.00 inc. VATCorsican Pine(Pinus nigra) is a species especially suited as windbreaks, preferring well drained soils and it can also tolerate coastal conditions. It is a two needle pine, the needles often being slightly twisted. Pinus nigra are found, in variations, round the Mediterranean. In the UK it is used in preference to Scots pine as a timber tree, for building and for pulp.
Not for forestry purposes.
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Crab Apple Seed
Malus sylvestrisPrice range: £5.00 through £10.00 inc. VATCrab Apples are small deciduous trees growing to 8m tall with white flowers that may be tinged with pink when they appear in late spring. Pollinated by bees. The fruits grow to 2.5cm across in the autumn and are sour to eat but make a delicious conserve. They are also good for wildlife with fruit remaining well into the winter. It can be pruned and chopped quite harshly if needed, in the winter.
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Creeping Dogwood Seed
Cornus canadensisPrice range: £5.00 through £14.00 inc. VATCreeping Dogwood is actually a herbaceous perennial with a creeping woody rootstock. It forms an attractive carpet of foliage starred with white flowers in May and June which are succeeded by bright red fruits in early autumn. The white ‘petals’ are really bracts surrounding balls of tiny flowers. Useful decorative ground cover for shady places and needs little maintenance.
pic courtesy of Superior National Forest, CC BY 2.0 , via Wikimedia Commons
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Damson Seed
Prunus domestica insititiaPrice range: £9.00 through £17.50 inc. VATThe damson is a subspecies of the plum. A small deciduous tree, it produces the oval damson fruit which has a green yellow flesh and dark blue or indigo skin. The fruits can hang shrivelled well into the winter. It produces white blossom in April, good for early pollinators. Pruning is not advisable in the winter because a bacterial canker can get into the wounds, but if necessary Damson can be chopped in the summer.
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Daphne / Spurge Laurel berries
Daphne mezereum£5.00 inc. VATDaphne mezereum is a small twiggy deciduous shrub that flowers in very early spring, before the leaves emerge. Highly scented purple red flowers are followed by poisonous scarlet fruits. It thrives on chalky soils. This product is sold as dried berries which are still poisonous. Slow growing and often used in winter gardens and medium scale rockeries. Once planted, it’s best not to transplant or disturb. Appreciates mulching with compost or leaf mould in late spring.
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Dawn Redwood Seed
Metasequoia glyptostroboidesPrice range: £5.00 through £10.00 inc. VATThe Dawn Redwood, thought of as a ‘living fossil’, is a deciduous conifer, the leaves of which turn tawny pink and old gold in autumn. It is fast growing and makes quite a narrow conical tree with a shaggy bark that falls off in ribbons. The trunk itself tends to be broad at the bottom. It is widely planted as an ornamental tree but in the wild the population is decreasing. It is protected in China, but over-collection of seed from the wild has resulted in a lack of regeneration in its native areas. The first fossils of the tree were discovered in 1941, in China, and were aged at 150million years old!
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Deodar Cedar Seed
Cedrus deodara£9.50 inc. VATDeodar Cedar is a large conifer with a pendulous growth habit when young. It keeps a droopy leading shoot even on mature trees. Needle-like leaves, up to 5cm long, have a bluish bloom when young. Architectural, so makes a good specimen tree. The timber is rot resistant, close grained and aromatic and therefore historically used for storage rooms and boxes, having a certain amount of anti-fungal and insect repellent properties. Deodar forests were/are thought to be sacred to the God Shiva and used as places of meditation. It is the national tree of Pakistan.
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Dog Rose Seed
Rosa canina£5.00 inc. VATThe Dog Rose is a hedgerow shrub with an open growth habit and long, arching, prickly stems. It is often used in reclamation planting and for land stabilisation. In early summer it produces large scented flowers that vary from pink through to white. The rosehips are egg shaped and bright red providing autumn colour and food for wildlife. Packed with vitamin C , the hips in the form of a tea have been used to treat kidney problems. The national flower of Romania
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Douglas Fir Seed
Pseudotsuga menziesii / taxifoliaPrice range: £6.00 through £14.00 inc. VATDouglas Fir is regarded as the king of the Pacific coast forests. It is a fast growing, large conifer with down swept branches in mature specimens. It is an important import to Europe for timber production, but also an ornamental tree of value. Sometimes grown as a Christmas tree especially in USA, when it has to be trimmed to grow into a neat shape with dense branches. The fissured bark carries resinous blisters and the foliage also has a resinous scent.
Not for forestry purposes.
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Dunkeld Larch Seed
Larix x eurolepsisPrice range: £5.00 through £26.00 inc. VATThe Dunkeld Larch was found in Dunkeld, Perthshire, in about 1897. It is an intermediate between the parents (kaempferi x decidua) but with hybrid vigour. A similar hybrid was found at about the same time in Switzerland hence the two different latin names! It is a variable deciduous conifer which gives good yellow autumn colour, contrasting well with other forestry trees. New growth varies from pink to orange brown. Tough, hardy and resilient.
Not for forestry purposes.
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Dwarf Mountain Pine (Mughus) Seed
Pinus mugo mughusPrice range: £5.00 through £19.00 inc. VATDwarf Mountain Pine is a shrubby conifer with dark green needles set in pairs. Mountain Pine succeeds on all well drained soils including chalk and limestone. A good evergreen addition to larger rock and scree gardens, adding form and winter interest.
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Eastern / Flowering Dogwood Seed
Cornus florida£7.00 inc. VATEastern / Flowering Dogwood is a large shrub or small tree. In winter the flower buds are enclosed in 4 white bracts which open in spring; the bracts form “petals” which are tinged pink at the apex forming a very pretty “flower.”
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Eglantine / Sweet Briar Seed
Rosa rubiginosa / eglanteria£5.00 inc. VATThe Eglantine Rose is a medium sized, dense, spiney deciduous shrub with aromatic leaves, smelling of apples. The single pink flowers are simple, beautiful and fragrant. Bright red oval hips persist well into the winter and are a good source of Vitamin C. In some countries (New Zealand, South Africa and Australia) it is seen as an invasive weed, but in UK there are no problems with it. Prune in autumn or winter and it can be sheared back quite hard if necessary.
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Elderberry / Common Elder Seed
Sambucus nigra£6.00 inc. VATElderberry is a large shrub or small tree with rugged bark and 5 to 7 leaflets. The leaves smell a bit odd. It bears flattened heads of white flowers in early summer which give rise to dense bunches of small black fruits. The fruit famously makes a good wine or can be used to flavour gin. The flowers are used to make cordial or champagne. It grows well on chalk and is being harvested commercially for both flowers and berries. Common in larger hedges and wood margins. It is excellent for wildlife – insects on the flowers and birds for the berries.
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