Country & Garden: Cuttings

News From The Gardeners' World

ECOBULBS, GROWN organically (without synthetic chemicals) in Holland, were introduced into the UK in a small way three years ago. Now the list has expanded to include snowdrops, crocuses, irises, fritillaries, alliums, oxalis and brodiaea. There are 58 different kinds of tulip (including one of my favourites, `Blue Parrot') and more than 20 different kinds of daffodil. EcoBulbs are available exclusively through the Organic Gardening Catalogue, established by the Henry Doubleday Research Association.

For a free copy write to the Organic Gardening Catalogue, Riverdene, Molesey Road, Hersham, Surrey KT12 4RG (01932 253666). The tulip `Blue Parrot' costs pounds 5.05 a dozen, and narcissus `Cavaliero', with deep gold, rounded petals and a rich orange-red cup costs pounds 5.50 a dozen. Postage and packing is pounds 2.50 for orders under pounds 30. Bulb orders must arrive by 15 October.

THE ROYAL Botanic Garden, Edinburgh has secured sponsorship from Bioforce, the United Kingdom's leading supplier of herbal medicines, to further its ambitious Flora Celtica project. The project is recording Scotland's wild plants, highlighting the ways that they can be used.

Flora Celtica researchers will record traditional and current applications of native plants, taking information from people such as Neil MacKinnon, who earns his living collecting seaweed on Tiree. For more information on the group's activities, visit its website at http://www.rbge. org.uk/research/celtica

THE FLOWER Show, a celebration of flowers in 20th-century art, opened recently at the Terrace Gallery, Harewood House, Leeds. The exhibition brings together more than 50 works by some of the century's finest artists, including David Hockney, Andy Warhol and Helen Chadwick. Oil paintings, watercolours, photographs and prints in the gallery are augmented by real flower "installations" in the church in and the walled garden at Harewood House.

Some modern artists, such as Matthew Smith with his Still Life, hark back to the classic tradition of flower painting established more than 300 years ago. Like the Japanese flower painters, Craigie Aitchison concentrates on purity of form in his Broken Pink Vase Still Life (1992-5). Paul Nash, whose 1928 painting Cactus is included in the show, is only one of the celebrated English war artists who, by engrossing themselves in flowers and landscape, left the horrors of war behind.

The Terrace Gallery is open daily (11-5). The admission charge of pounds 5.75 also gives access to the grounds. The exhibition runs until 31 October.