We are a small family run  retail plant nursery in the  north west Highlands,   Ron Rushbrooke is the  owner, he does the  Bookshop & also works as  the gardener on the estate  the nursery is on.  If you  visit the nursery it is His  wife Lesley and eldest son  Ben that you will see, as  they run the nursery.   Growing & Selling Plants in Tournaig For Over 30 Years How it all began, Ron (on the right) in the sales area with  his brother Wilfred in early June1979, we started with a few  bedding plants & cacti sold from a lain down old door. Slowly we have grown over the years, clearing more and  more Rhododendron ponticum and adding more sales area  & expanding our range.   Made with Xara © Garden Cottage Nursery, 2011 Before His 2nd birthday Ben was already directing  operations in the nursery.   32 years later & things are bit more developed with  hundreds of different plants on sale amongst the  established flower beds.     What It Is We Do The nursery is open from March to October and we try to offer a good selection of seasonal  items such as flowering bulbs in spring and bedding plants in May & June, along with our year  round mainstays of alpines, herbaceous & shrubs. We grow a good number of the plants you will see on sale right from seeds or cuttings, others  from small plants called liners or bought in as finished plants for (hopefully) immediate resale. In spite of what you might of heard it doesn’t actually rain all of the time here & sometimes we  do have to water the plants. Though it does rain quite a lot & it can often get rather windy. Due to the interesting climate of the Northwest Highlands we grow lots of plants that will thrive in exposed & boggy conditions, things like  Olearia, Hebe, Astilbe & Primula that are difficult to grow in drier & colder parts of the country. We sow seeds collected the  previous year in early spring.     As the seedlings grow they  are pricked-out into plug trays  which we also use for  inserting softwood & later  semi-ripe cuttings.     When they have outgrown the  confines of their cell in the  plug tray we pot them on into  an 8cm or 9cm wide pot.      Once they’re sufficiently  established in their small pot  they will go out on sale if they  are a small rockery plant or if  a larger herbaceous perennial  or shrub, go up into a bigger  pot for sale as a larger plant  later.     Many of our evergreen shrubs  are raised from hardwood  cuttings taken in autumn in a  cold frame & lifted in late  spring and potted into 9cm or  1L pots.     Many of our herbaceous  perennials are propagated by  division of large pot or open  ground grown plants.     All these stages involve lots of  potting & carrying plants  around. We use sturdy pots, a  high quality peat-based potting compost through which we mix  Osmocote control release  fertiliser & Met52 fungal  insecticide to control the hated  vine weevil.      Finally once the plants are  good & ready they go out on  sale!     What Else We Do Throughout the summer months Lesley heads off with a van crammed  with horticultural delights & can be found with her plant stall at these local  markets: Poolewe Tuesday Market in Poolewe Village Hall every Tuesday Ullapool Market in the car park of the Seaforth Hotel every other  Saturday Lochcarron Producers Day in Lochcarron Village Hall the last Friday of  each month. If you live a bit too far away from Tournaig to come round, but near  enough to Ullapool or Lochcarron drop us a line by phone on (01445 781777) or by EMAIL a couple of days before the market & Lesley can bring along any special requests for you. “What Do You Do In The Winter?” Although the Nursery shuts to the public at the end of October we keep on working. We are often asked the question “what do you do in the  winter?” Well we tidy up the nursery & put plants away for the winter, placing those that need protection from the wet & cold under cover. We  operate a mail order service during October to March too so this keeps the some income coming in. Also around the festive season Lesley sells bowls of hyacinths & hand made fresh wreaths & table decorations. A lot of the construction, repair & maintenance work to the nursery is done in the winter months when there are no customers in the way & we  can make a mess in peace. Then of course being where we are there are plenty of winter storms to clear up after or over the last two harsh  winter snow & ice problems.  A few years ago Ron decided he would like to start selling second hand  books as a job to keep him busy into his retirement. We got a big second  hand Portakabin from the local builder & after much shouggling around it  was slotted into our less than flat nursery. Once in place we stuffed it floor to ceiling with shelves filled with books Then we went outside looked at  this large metal carbuncle (in a dingy shade of pale yellow) & thought we  can either cover it in camouflage paint & hope no one notices it, or accept it’s presence & try & jolly it up, so we went with the later (stealth  bookshops don’t sell many books). So we asked a reformed graffiti artist  to see what he could do. And people seems to like the results. In August 2011 the small office upstairs in Poolewe Village Hall 2 miles  away became available. It is above Ron & Lesley’s daughter Alison’s  Button Bothy jewellery workshop & studio. Ron took on the lease &  stuffed it with more books. Visitors to Poolewe can now get a taster of  what more delights are to be found up at Tournaig. The more specialist titles Ron has acquired are listed on the on-line  second-hand book sellers marketplace  AbeBooks. If you have any book-based enquires contact Ron at:  ron@gcnursery.co.uk  see the bookshop page for more details Producing Plants