25 July 2021
Calling all Borris-in-Ossory Garden Club Members!
With the easing of Covid restrictions Margaret Ryan has once again kindly invited us to visit her lovely garden. It will be a picnic so bring along your favourite picnic goodies! Margaret will provide tea and coffee!
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Saturday 8th August - 2pm to 5 pm
Her Eircode is R32 K5X7
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25 July 2020
First Garden Visit since the arrival of Covid-19
Thank you Margaret for sharing your lovely garden with us!
And a cup of tea to make the day perfect!
December 2018
The Christmas meeting is always about arrangements for Christmas. Fergal is joined by Joanna for this event. She is a true artist and always gives a great demonstration. Fergal also demonstrates the standard designs associated with Christmas. 
This year we learned how to make Christmas Wreaths from conifers as well as a graceful pedestal arrangement that would make a lovely Christmas gift! We finished up with tea and cakes! All over for this year! No meeting in January (unless you want to do the St Brigid's Crosses on 31st at 7 pm) so we meet again on 7th February
November 2018
Lots of good advice on how to prepare our gardens for the winter and get ahead for the new season. It is planned to have a regular meeting of the Gardening Club the first Thursday in February 2019. In the past this has been combined with the making of St Brigid's Crosses for the parish the last week in January. This will be done as a separate event 31st January 7 pm to 8 pm. A small sub-committee was agreed to follow up on the diary/calendar idea/
October 2018
The AGM took place in October. The committee agreed to stay on for another year. October is a busy time in the garden and Fergal also reminded us of how to take hard-wood cuttings. The group have also agreed to investigate the possibility of making a diary/calendar with a gardening focus based on a sample brought to the meeting by a member. It would be intended that it would be for the year 2020!
September 2018
The Tasting was a great success but Fergal also made sure that we got our advice and demonstration first! It was amazing to see the spread that was produced from our own gardens!
August 2018
Back after the Summer break we needed lots of help with the drought damage so many of our gardens suffered this year. Fergal encouraged us to have patience with the plants and that many of them would come back when the weather changed. We agreed to have a Tasting at the September meeting and we were encouraged to bring along items made from our own gardens!
May 2018
As usual Fergal had lots of advice and demonstrations to get us up and running for the coming season including how to transplant our seedlings - but with a warning not to be in a hurry to plant things outside with the danger of late frosts still with us.
We have been invited as a club to enter the Fairy Garden competition being run in Mountrath Library with the closing date for entries Tuesday 15th May. We are having a special session to create our entries on Monday 14th May.
April 2018
After a very long winter the Gardening Club got going properly this week. There was a great attendance to hear Fergal giving us lots of hints and tips as well as practical demonstrations on planting seeds and taking slips. There is no excuse for us now - out we go and get planting!
December - 1 December 2016
We had a great demonstration on making Christmas table decorations and swags. Feargal had made very clear demonstration boards to help us create our own items. The photos tell the story!
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| Demonstration board |
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| What the club produced!!!! |
November - apologies - I was unable to attend this meeting.
October Meeting & AGM - 6 October 2016
The October meeting of the Gardening Club included sampling of some delicious fruit crumble made with fruits currently being harvested in Fergal's garden. The AGM was also held and the committee for the coming year was elected. (Sorry - don't have the names of the nes committee - I'll update them later)
Fancroft Mill and Gardens Visit - 1st July 2016
The Gardening Club made a visit to Fancroft Mill and Gardens at the beginning of the month. Marcus Sweeney and his wife Irene made us very welcome. The tour of the Mill was fascinating. The restoration of the Mill has been a 10-year project and is definitely a labour of love! We sampled some delicious scones made with flour actually milled on-site! Then it was out to the garden which was designed and developed by Angela Jupe but is now maintained by Irene and she confesses to adding some ideas of her own to the original design!
June Meeting
At the June meeting we once more had an interesting talk from Mary Keenan from Gash Gardens just up the road at Castletown. As usual Mary gave a lively talk about plants and planting accompanied by great slides from her own garden. It was a great evening with tea and cakes for all who attended!
The arrangements were finalised for the Club's visit to Fancroft Mill and Gardens on Sunday 3rd July. Non-members are also welcome to join us visiting this very interesting place. Meet at St. Canices Hall at 10 am if you want to go. Admission is €15 which includes guided tour and talk on the restoration of the mill, as well as a guided tour of the gardens and the very welcome tea and scones!
May Meeting
The May meeting was a lively one with the usual excellent advice from Fergal and timely reminders about sowing seeds for vegetables. He strongly recommends that if there are old seed packets lying around it is a waste of time planting them as the results are usually very poor - his advise is "ditch the old packets and get nice fresh ones instead".
Suzette also gave a very interesting recipe for a Pesto made from wild garlic. Just harvest leaves and flowers, chop them finely and add some chopped pine nuts and a small amount of Olive Oil. Blend well and its ready to use! She ahd brought a sample so we all had a taste - it was excellent!
We wer also reminded that Nettle Tea made by chopping nettles into a bucket and covering with water strained after 24 hours makes excellent greenfly killer. Leave it to ferment longer - about 10 days 1 and it becomes a good fertiliser - dilute the evil-smilling liquid till it is the colour of light tea!
April Meeting on the FIRST Thursday!
March Meeting
At the March meeting there was the usual excellent advice for the Gardeners at the club taking in what to do now in the Vegetable Garden with a demonstration on how to sow seeds to get the best results.
There is always good discussions at this club with gardeners sharing their experiences and getting sound advice on how to get the most from their gardens!
This is also the time to clear weeds from paths before they get too big.
February Meeting
The first full meeting of the Gardening Club took place on 11th February.
As always Feargal gave lost of good advice on what to do now. The club went to Suzettes again this year for a lesson in pruning Fruit Trees. This is the right time of year to transplant shrubs and also to plant new ones. If it isn't too waterlogged, the lawn can also be cut. An important task at this time of year is tidying up the Perennials. Cutting away all the old dead foliage neatens up the garden. All this material can be chopped or shredded and added to the compost heap. Indoors we can start planting seeds for some vegetables and half-hardy annuals. Sort out the seed packets and DISCARD old seeds - you will avoid much disappointment if you you do!
Its better to use companion planting to keep pests away from your vegetables instead of spraying.
Deep digging is out of fashion - the no-dig method where compost is laid on top of the soil is now recommended.
If you must spray for weed control try and spray in the evening to avoid harming the beneficial insects such as bees
Next meeting of the Gardening Club will be on 10th March. All are welcome!
St Brigids Crosses - 27 January 2016
The Borris-in-Ossory Gardening Club met on the 27th to do the traditional task of making the St Brigids's Crosses for distribution at Mass on St Brigids Day. This is a lovely old tradition and it was lovely to see people working away at the Crosses as they chatted about everyday things. i hope these photos capture the atmosphere of the evening.
December Meeting 2015
We made candle centrepiece holders on Thursday and had coffee and some home baking. Very pleasant Christmas gathering .We are meeting on the 28th of January to make St.Brigid's Crosses for the church ..is not a regular meeting. It's sole purpose is to make the crosses!
Our next regular meeting is second Thursday in Feb.
November Meeting 2015
The November meeting featured a great demonstration of the making of decorations from the evergreen materials in the garden and including some late flowers to finish them off. Fergal as usual made it all seem so easy! The lovely items were raffled among the members at the end of the night. One of the members brought along some cordial made from Honey and spices for us to sample!
Next month will be a practical meeting with the members getting the opportunity to create their own masterpieces! Materials such as oasis etc will be available on the night at a very reasonable cost but you should bring your own foliage etc. For this special Christmas meeting the time will change to 7.30 pm instead of 8 pm and tea will be served. Visitors are welcome!
