Roundstone Nurseries produce a wide range of high quality ornamental plants including the everyday favourites of Primroses, Pansies, Begonias, Cyclamen, Lobelia and Impatiens and also more exclusive varieties such as Canna Lilies. Within our increasingly successful organic and non-organic vegetable ranges we grow plants to produce interesting varieties of potatoes, tomatoes, peppers, herbs and chillies, to name but a few. We are renowned for growing new exclusive varieties in plugs, pack and pot bedding
Cutting raised products such as Petunia, Surfinias, Fuchsias and Bacopas are all planted by hand in a range of different plug tray sizes from 48 to 126 cells. This is the most labour intensive operation in the business.
Seed raised products such as Impatiens, Petunia, Pansies and Primroses are sown by two types of machine; a drum seeder which is versatile for short sowing runs and a high speed, high accuracy, Decop plate seeder for large production runs. Seed can be sown into Super Seedling trays (compressed peat pellets, which are easy to handle) or loose peat filled plug trays. We can sow up to 300 trays per hour in various plug trays from 405 to 126 cells. These are then distributed through the business for our own production, or sold to other growers and retailers.
The plug trays used for our own production are predominantly transplanted by machines into both pack and pot bedding. There are 5 transplanters producing pack bedding that, during our peak season from March to April, run 24 hours a day, 7 days a week transplanting up to 90,000 boxes or 3.3 million plugs per day.
In 2009, we will produce approximately 6.5 million packs in various sizes including 6 and 12 cell packs, and value multi-packs in 15, 24 or 30 cells. We will also produce in excess of 2.1 million pots and hanging baskets, in a wide range of different sizes including 9cm, 10.5cm and 1, 2 & 6 litres. Our top sellers are Impatiens, Petunia and Lobelia which makes up 31% of the total packs produced, with over 18 million Impatiens seeds sown each year.
All Pack and Pot products are quality checked prior to dispatch to ensure they meet the high standard that we demand and that our customers expect. Product that has passed quality control is then pre-priced though 5 pricing lines that can price up to 86,000 boxes per day and picked into customer orders though a bespoke state of the art collation machine. During our peak season from April to May, these machines will run 24/7, collating up to 1,200 trolleys per day for immediate dispatch to our customers.
