Some of you may remember I held my first training day last year for winter pruning. It was such a resounding success with great feedback I’ve decided to do it again, only this time bigger!
So what can you expect?
The Venue
This year we will be holding our first event at a private house with a large walled garden in Buckinghamshire on the 3rd February 2018 .
Approximately 25 fruit trees of a decent age to challenge yourself with & 2 instructors on-hand with between them over 25 years experience.Places will be limited so please contact A.SA.P. to reserve your place, all details will be sent through to you Via email as soon as we have heard from you.
The Instructors
At this point I’d like to introduce you to Nick Black.
Nick is a fully trained arborist & whilst we don’t expect you to be climbing trees like this his knowledge of both how trees work & horticulture is invaluable.
Nick can be found normally working as The Muddy Gardener. You can also find him being cheeky on twitter @imnickblack
As for me, I have nearly 20 years of looking after fruit trees under my belt, trained at Pershore college under John Edgerly, then at Ryton Organic gardens, I moved onto become the Veg gardener at Sissinghurst where we established a large Orchard under Amy Wardman who had been the Fruit student at RHS Wisley and was very generous at passing on her knowledge.
I was there that I first started training people to prune fruit & it gives me great joy to help people become confident and proficient.
The course
The day will start at 10am where you will all gather and we can discuss where your skill level is as we are happy to take on absolute beginners through to those that have experience & want to progress.
You will be shown all the tools you will need and have their safe use & maintenance explained to you. Then we will go through pruning maiden trees to establish the correct framework for freestanding, espalier, fan & other styles of fruit trees.
After a short break, to warm up & refuel on hot tea & cake, we will start to tackle the big trees! This will give us an excellent opportunity to discuss different methods of pruning & the reasons for it. If you have a tree which has got out of hand this will be exactly what you need!
A break for a warming lunch of soup and then..
Once the demonstration is over you will be let loose on your own trees with both of us at your beck & call for advice if you get stuck!
Finally, we will gather to discuss any questions & do a quick session on apple tree pest, diseases & disorders
The Cost
The day will cost £60.00 per person but will include Drinks, soup & snacks
Also £20 will go straight to Marie curie via my Just giving page
If youd like to sign up just fill in the form below and I will send you further details or if you wish to buy it as an xmas present for a loved one and keep it as a surprise we can arrange that too, look forward to hearing from you
Louise Nicholls - Adventures in horticulture 
Good luck with your course Lou. I wish I lived nearer. That’s such a reasonable price for a course. I shall promote you like mad! Love karen x
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Thank you Karen! 🙂
We wanted to keep the price affordable for all plus encourage people to join in as its for charity x
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Good idea. I will spread the word 🙂 x
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What’s your maximum number and the deadline for applying for the course?
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Hi Karen, looking at around 15 Max & deadline will be when we’ve run out of places, I wish I could be more exact but it’s on a first come first served basis. When we are full I’ll update the post accordingly x
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I did a course with John at Pershore, it was most valuable to me, not just for pruning my own fruit trees, also my clients with confidence. I hope you have a good attendance with supporting such a worthy cause. I will now go and have a look at the muddy gardener.
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John is awesome! I was really lucky to have him as one of my tutors at pershore & thank you 😊
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