What is included in the Gardeners’ Selection Pack?
Each Gardeners’ Selection Pack contains:
- a third of a square metre of sheep wool garden felt
- multi-pack of jute mulch mats (4” x 8, 6” x 6, 8” x 4)
- 150g bag of felt shillies
- 150g of wool pellets
- 100g of natural Herdwick wool
- natural beeswax hand cream made from rescued bees
- a third of a metre of our lovely garden fleece
All of the products designed to be used on the garden are completely biodegradable and compostable.
How can each of the different products in the Gardeners’ Selection Pack be used?
- Sheep’s Wool Garden Felt - produced in Yorkshire, our 100% natural sheep’s wool garden felt can definitely be crowned as our most versatile garden product. Here are a few of our favourite ways to use it:
- Mulching areas of a garden or allotment for a ‘no-dig’ method of gardening
- Creating new beds without digging out turf by using the felt to cover areas of grass or weeds and topping it with compost
- Using it when planting out a vegetable patch to protect against weeds, slugs and snail infestations
- Keeping delicate plants protected and warm in the winter
- Tied around roots balls of trees to protect them when transplanted
- Capillary matting in plant pots
- As a base layer for propagating seeds indoors
- Jute Mulch Mats - made from recycled jute coffee sacks they fit neatly into pots or directly onto beds to protect plants. They do this by:
- Reducing water evaporation
- Creating a natural barrier against weeds
- Reducing competition for water and nutrients
- Reducing temperature fluctuations of the soil and roots
- Providing nutrients for the plants as they compost down
- Helping to deter greedy slugs and snails
- Felt Shillies - these are made from the scraps of felt leftover from the production of our Chimney Sheep and resemble the traditional slate shillies. These act as a mulch and are great for putting around the base of delicate plants. Doing so will:
- Shield plants from harsh temperatures and weather conditions and our shillies give that bit of extra ‘oomph’ on top of this./li>
- Absorb moisture and release it slowly due to the hygroscopic nature of Herdwick wool (which means you don’t have to spend as much time watering).
- Deter slugs and snails due to the texture of the wool.
- Wool Pellets – made from a combination of sheep’s wool and muck, pressed into pellet form creating a nutrient-rich mulch and soil improver. They absorb water, as they biodegrade they slowly release nutrients into the soil (from the wool) and they deter slugs and snails. These are great to use in hanging baskets, allotments, vegetable patches and to help ornamental plants and flowers.
- Natural Herdwick Wool – Herdwick wool in its natural state is great to dot around your garden our put into a bird feeder so that birds can peck it out and use it inside their nest. Wool really is a wonderous material!
- Natural Beeswax Handcream – made by TreeBee is perfect for those chapped, dry and stressed gardeners’ hands. Made with beeswax and geranium oil the organic moisturiser is a hardworking gardener’s staple! Sometimes we use hand cream from Aries, depending on what's available. The TreeBee hand cream is made from beeswax from rescued bees, that have set up home somewhere they're not wanted. The bees are gently moved on to a more suitable site, and any beeswax left behind is used to make this gorgeous hand cream.
- Gardeners Fleece - the gardeners who work at Chimney Sheep love this product so much you're lucky we had a lot of it made or there would be none left!! It's perfect for protecting delicate plants from frost, but it can also be used for keeping insects off, as a deer deterrent, and when gently washed it can be used for all kinds of craft projects.
Who would this gift box be appropriate for?
Anyone who loves gardening! They could have a little garden, a big garden, an allotment, a vegetable patch, some potted plants on the balcony – anything. This is a particularly good present for people who like organic and chemical-free gardening methods or methods such as the no-dig method.
