This is a list of my top 51 garden websites - excluding the Times Online
excellent site which answers your questions and gives a raft of gardens to
visit, ideas, and ‘how to’ series from the experts.
We’d like to hear your comments on the websites below plus your own favourites
- please say why you rate them. Every few months we will add a category –
such as garden buildings, or tools – as well as refreshing and updating the
list below and adding some of your recommendations.
General garden sites
I Kew Gardens - the latest
ecological and botanical news with a good area for schools. www.kew.org
2 Garden advice - excellent tips
on everything from building decking to lawncare. www.gardenadvice.co.uk
3 Garden Organic - one of
Europe's largest green gardening organisations Garden Organic gives advice
on every aspect of gardening the green way down to constructing your own
compost bin. Not as glamorous as better funded sites – the excellence goes
into the content. www.gardenorganic.org.uk
4 The BBC’s gardening website
- simple, straightforward advice, plenty of inspirational stuff plus
encouragement from the stars of Gardeners’ World. www.bbc.co.uk
5 The Royal
Horticultural Society - has trails, an advice service and school
facilities in all its four gardens plus a website that supports this. The
site is not as good as it should be given the wealth of information at its
green fingertips – it’s still difficult to find information. www.rhs.org.uk
6 Thrive – well-established
charity helping anyone with a disability to carry on gardening. www.carryongardening.org.uk
7 Gardening
– the subscriber-only website for Gardens Monthly. You can find Charlie
Dimmock and her water features here. www.gardening.co.uk
8 Crocus - one of the longest surviving
online garden centres. Alan Titchmarsh writes for it and the archive is full
of ideas and advice. But the merchandise tends to be on the pricey side. www.crocus.co.uk
9 Gardening Which? -
well-researched advice and month by month tips. www.which.co.uk
10 Gardening Express - online
garden centre with seriously low prices but limited plant range. The video
advice from Capel Manor gardening college is excellent and especially good
for beginners. www.gardeningexpress.co.uk
11 Greenfingers - a slightly
eccentric site with a vast range of hardware including a pack-away garden
sink and a pink tool belt (no gardener should be without one). This is
mostly an online shop although the site includes some gardening essays. www.greenfingers.com
12 The Gardening
Website - slow and not particularly easy on the eye, the content is
nevertheless usefully arranged into garden products by location. For
instance, everything from garden centres to fencing experts is arranged
county by county. www.thegardeningwebsite.co.uk
Seeds
13 Chiltern Seeds -
their long, thin catalogue, thick enough to be used as a fly swatting for a
year or more, has been in my life for as long as I can remember. Their range
of rare and unusual seed continues to seduce generations of gardeners, on
and off line. Their site is even more alluring than their catalogue thanks
to plant pictures www.edirectory.co.uk/chilternseeds
14 Jungle Seeds - a relatively new
kid on the block, it is superb both in content (masses of exotics to grow in
this country) and ease of access. www.jungleseeds.co.uk
15 Thomson and Morgan -
professional, easy-to-use website. Thompson and Morgan has been at it for
years and they are still one of the most original plant and seed sellers.
Their normal collection has now been augmented by Dutch bulbs. www.thompson-morgan.com
16 Plant World - what this
site lacks in looks it makes up for in range of seed http://home.btclick.com/plantworld/
17 Plants of Distinction - a simple
to use, straight forward website showing clear pictures of many of the
plants on sale. www.podseeds.co.uk
18 Suttons - another
long-lived professional outfit, this one with the Alan Titchmarsh garden
ranges. www.suttons.co.uk
19 Unwins - probably one of the
world leaders for sweet peas. Also a good range of basic flower and
vegetable seed plus straight forward cultivation notes and advice on pest
and disease control. www.unwins-seeds.co.uk
20 Nicky’s
Nursery - good selection of orientals which includes several unusual
aubergines. www.nickys-nursery.co.uk
Bulbs
21 Bloms Bulbs - attractive, easy to
use site with clear pictures of the plants. www.blomsbulbs.com
22 Avon Bulbs - no Royal Horticulture
show would be the same without one of this company’s beautiful displays.
Their site isn’t quite as beautiful but still stocked with such alluring
delights that I’ve just ordered Anemone blanda (blue) to go under the
stubborn shade of a yew tree which may be too much for them. This site tells
me that the plants will grow into ‘think clumps’. I like the idea. www.avonbulbs.com
23 J Parkers - straight-forward site
although the plant range is limited www.jparkers.co.uk
24 Bakker - anyone on their mailing list
is bombarded by offers of cheap bulbs always accompanied by implausible
giveaways - like phones. The prices are good but the range is limited. www.bakker.co.uk
Allotments
25 National Society of Allotment and
Leisure Garden - tips from how to get an allotment in the first place to
video clips to help you make the most of your allotted space. www.nsalg.demon.co.uk
Garden history
26 The Museum of Garden History
- has a clear site outlining aspects of garden history. Let it tempt you to
visit the place itself just opposite the Houses of Parliament where the
displays and garden include a good value café. www.museumgardenhistory.org
27 Garden History Society -
great way to enrich your knowledge of gardens and landscapes. www.gardenhistorysociety.org
Garden design and construction
28 Society for Garden Designers - lists
qualified or experienced (the two don’t always go together) designers by
geographical area. www.sgd.org.uk
29 BALI - is a listing of
contractors who can transform a designer’s plan – or your own – into the
real thing. Lets hope the contractors work faster than Bali’s cumbersome
site. www.bali.co.uk
Individual designers whose work I know and recommend
30 Cleve West - brilliant, subtle,
sculptural work which has won many Chelsea golds. www.clevewest.com
31 James Alexander Sinclair -
highly original designs on new and historic sites plus one of the most
entertaining blogs in the business. www.blackpitts.co.uk
32 Andy Sturgeon - regular Chelsea
medalist. Modern designs and planting. www.andysturgeon.com
33 Ann-Marie Powell
- one of the great underestimated creative forces in the garden works whose
practical designs addresses all the senses. www.ann-mariepowell.com
34 Diarmuid Gavin -
iconoclastic designs from the garden world’s wild boy. www.diarmuidgavindesigns.co.uk
35 Tom Stuart-Smith - Statesman
of the landscape world with elegance has the default position of his
designs. www.tomstuartsmith.co.uk
36 Phillippa May - new kid
on the block. Landscape architect already transforming private estates in
the north of England. www.phillippamaydesign.co.uk
37 Bunny Guinness - excellent
practical designs particularly for family gardens. Outstanding planting. www.bunnyguinness.com
Garden visiting
38 The National Gardens Scheme - has a
first-class website listing, county by county, of all the gardens, private
or otherwise, that open for the NGS charity in any given year. Many of these
gardens are never normally open to the public. www.ngs.org.uk
39 National Trust - guardian of
many of our most important landscapes and gardens. Their website is
frustratingly low on detail about gardens but basics like address, opening
times and admission fees are included. www.nationaltrust.org.uk
40 English Heritage - I
sometimes feel English Heritage would prefer that the public did not visit
their gardens and their website hasn’t done much to dispel this feeling. But
it’s worth persevering particularly to se gems like Wrest in Bedfordshire. www.english-heritage.org.uk
Green/wildflower gardening
41 Square foot gardening - helps
those with small gardens grow a huge number and variety of vegetables. www.squarefootgardening.com
42 The Wildflower Society -
helps keep tabs on all natives. www.thewildflowersociety.com
43 Scots Wildflowers - sells
wildflower seeds and give sound cultivation advice. Simple, accessible site. www.scottswildflowers.co.uk
44 The Organic Catalogue -
Everything the ‘green’ gardener could ever want from pest and disease
control to organic seed to excellent advice. Better still this company helps
fund Garden Organic the organic gardening charity. www.Organiccatalog.com
45 Garden Organic - one of the
world’s leading organic gardening sites. Excellent advice, ideas and fact
sheets. www.gardenorganic.org.uk
46 Green Gardener - good site for
all the ‘green’ basics. www.greengardener.co.uk
47 Nemasis - how to use nematodes to
conquer many garden enemies. www.nemasysinfo.com
48 Agralan - for information on slug,
vine weevil, chafer grub and leatherjacket control and non-chemical
pesticides. www.agralan.co.uk
49 Wiggly Wigglers - composting
made entertaining. The site is brilliant both in content (everything you’ve
ever wanted to know about composting) plus speed. www.wigglywigglers.co.uk
Garden Gossip
50 Garden Banter - where to let
off steam and swap ideas/pictures and thoughts. www.gardenbanter.co.uk
For kids
51 Aggie-horticulture
- is based in Texas but the children’s pages have good ideas which can be
adapted to our plant palette. http://aggie-horticulture.tamu.edu
Surely Gardenvisit.com is the best and best website for garden visiting http://www.gardenvisit.com/. It claims to have 2,373 gardens in its Garden Finder!
John Blinker, London, UK
There are hundreds of gardens open daily to the public, but very few have a larger, more informative and interesting website than http://www.winsfordwalledgarden.com. Based upon a restored garden whose owners have done all the work themselves, even restoring the teak Victorian greenhouses.
Tatiana Gilmore, Okehampton, UK
One gem that is hard to find in the search results is:
http://www.smart-gardening.co.uk
Pages of advice on choosing tools and machinery, turfing, lawn care. Plus guides on fencing, splitting firewood, hedge cutting, chainsaw use etc. A refreshing change from most of the rehashed articles on the Internet where the writers don't seem to know what they're writing about.
K. Lewis, Worthing, UK
www.realgardeners.co.uk is a site built by real gardeners in the UK for real gardeners worldwide. It's well worth spending time there and benefitting from shared gardening experiences from expert and beginner gardeners alike.
Chris Ann, Bridport, Dorset, UK
What about www.MyFolia.com?
It's only been around for a couple of months, but it's becoming an absolutely amazingly useful site for tracking and journalling my plants and seeing what others are growing around the world...there seems to be some great up and coming websites out there at the moment, here's hoping the Times does this list for 2008, should be interesting to see who they include....
Jane H, Leeds, UK
As you have listed Garden Organic twice (nos.3 & 45) - can I suggest that you substitute one entry with www.haxnicks.co.uk.
Haxnicks,are a sponsor of Garden Organic, and specialise in non-chemical forms of plant protection, with many essential tools for successful home-grown vegetables.
Philippa Anderson, Wincanton, Somerset
www.growsonyou.com - the world's first social netowrking site for gardeners should be added
Gemma Jones, Derby,
Try adding Seeds of Change USA with a decent listing of organic gardening products and tips and links to some OK US Organic orgs.
Ken, Brooklyn, USA
Re M Goodsell's comment.
For example?
The Garden Monkey, London,
do you have 51 usa sites???
robert earnest, lumberton, nc/USA
This is mostly an indiscrimate list of sites that advertise most heavily. There are far better sites to be discovered by anybody who takes the time to dig a bit deeper.
M Goodsell, Spalding,