Kitchen Garden Forum

Reading Monty Dons article in Sat Daily Mail, I notice he was pushing Seed Storage Tins, prices ranged from £5.99 to £19.99. As most people buy either a box of sweets or biscuits for Xmas, hay presto we have a seed tin.

Fools and their money are soon parted! I expect most of us on here keep our seeds in a variety of second-hand sealable containers. I keep mine in two reclaimed clip-lid plastic boxes which belonged to my late father-in-law. They're deep enough to hold the packets upright so I file them in alphabetical order, so can usually find what I want quite quickly.

What really gets me are things like the little poncy little enamel watering cans for pot plants which they sell in gift shops like the National Trust for a small fortune. I've been using a cheapo plastic one for the last umpteen years and when it breaks I'll probably use a large plastic milk bottle instead!

I saw sets of these in my local garden centre yesterday.

If you need to label herbs, perhaps you shouldn't be growing them

Must be something about herbs - I was given a set like that several years ago made of the clay like clay pots.

Geoff - I think they design these things specifically to solve the birthday present/Christmas present dilemma for "people who like gardening", i.e. What on earth can we give Uncle George / Auntie Ann?" "Oh I know, he/she likes gardening, we'll give them one of these."

I must confess, I'd far rather be given a National Garden Token for much less money than some of these items cost, which could be used to buy something really useful like essential compost, etc. Why is it that people don't like to buy unglamorous presents, even if they're really useful? Somebody can give me a barrowload of manure any time they like and it would be rapturously received