Plants managed in Europe by Plants For Europe Limited scooped two awards in the new plants competition at Plantarium last month.

Euphorbia martinii Ascot Rainbow, bred by David Glenn in Australia, won a bronze medal. This superb variegated Euphorbia is set to become the benchmark variety by which others are judged. The leaves are have a generous yellow margin on rich green and the stems and young foliage are tinted red. The variegation even continues into the flowers. It has a compact and bushy habit and exhibits a very high degree of stability – far better than any previous variegated Euphorbia.

Cistus x hybridus Little Miss Sunshine (DUNNECIS), bred by Kieran Dunne in Ireland, was award a silver medal. This is an excellent new variegated form of Cistus x hybridus (formerly known as Cistus corbariensis) with leaves of rich green with a broad butter yellow margin. The plant produces a mass of white flowers in summer and is compact and bushy – but more vigorous than competing varieties. It also withstands transport well, particularly if grown hard, whereas competing varieties have been observed to turn black after a period without light in a lorry.

Young plants of the Euphorbia are currently available from Florensis. Young plants of the Cistus are available from New Place Nurseries.

Please contact us if you require further information.

Graham will be at the Four Oaks Trade Show in Cheshire on Wednesday 8th September only. If you wish to meet him there, please contact us in the usual way.

We wish that this event was a week later – it falls too close to the first days of the school term, clashes with the Flormart event in Padua, Italy, and also coincides with the Jewish holidays so that many of our Israeli friends will not be attending.

Graham will be at Plantarium next week, on Tuesday evening, Wednesday and Thursday.

If you wish to meet Graham at the event, then please contact us in the usual way.

That’s quite a job!

The full job specification can be found by clicking here.

We shall watch this closely to see who is appointed and will then speculate wildly to try and second guess what the appointment will mean for the future of the CPVO and European PVRs.

Visitors to PFE HQ should expect extended journey times in the coming weeks due to a terrible combination of roadworks in our area.

• The A272 is to be closed between Coopers Green and Hadlow Down (about one mile south of our office) for five weeks commencing 26 July. This will result in increased traffic on the local lanes around our offices and makes east-west travel difficult.
• The A26 will have serious delays during roadworks at Eridge Green (two miles south of Tunbridge Wells) for twelve weeks commencing 26 July. We estimate that this could add 15 to 20 minutes to north-south journey times at peak hours.
• Selsfield Road in East Hoathly is to be closed for five weeks from 26 July. This road is our most direct route to/from Crawley, Gatwick Airport and the M23 and often comes up on satnav systems and Google Maps. Please use the A264/A22 instead and allow an extra ten minutes.

If you require advice on travelling to our office, or would rather meet somewhere else, then please contact us.

We were impressed by the new HTA National Plant Show at Stoneleigh Park this week. It got a large proportion of the UK’s major growers together under one roof. There seemed a few prominent companies missing, but perhaps they were waiting to see how the first year worked out.

One of the best features was the new plant competition. It was great to see more than 50 entries covering all types of garden plants. A few creases need to be ironed out (why were some Nemesia varieties classed as annuals whilst others were classed as perennials? Surely it would be better to have a “patio and bedding” class instead) but overall our impression was positive. We’ll be looking to support this further in coming years.

This year, five PFE-managed varieties were in the competition. It is a reflection of the quality of output from our breeders that four of these plants were given awards:

• Nemesia Framboise (bred by Martine Tellwright) – GOLD
• Leucanthemum Real Galaxy (Richard Read and Keith Lintott) – SILVER
• Geum Totally Tangerine (Tim Crowther) – BRONZE
• Nemesia Mirabelle (Martine Tellwright) – BRONZE

For details on any of these plants, please contact us.