A preview by Michael Smith (Veshengro)
The other day the Spring 2010 and the Spring 2010 Garden & Gift Catalog from Lakeland arrived on my doormat and, once again, the catalogs are full of exiting things, new ones as well as old favorites.
The things that particular have caught my attention are the fold-up wooden stool on page 7; ideal for reaching those tops of cupboards. The frying-pan rack on page 9. If you are forever lost as to where to store those frying pans, and especially the cast iron skillets – which must not be stored in each other – then this rack is the ideal answer.
Then there is the corner rack on page 10 and the handy step on page 11, followed in the cleaning department by the Ostrich Feather duster on page 45. If you hate dusting as much as me then this probably is the right tool.
In the storage section the Leather-Look Storage Boxes on page 70 caught my attention, as well as, and especially, the OXO Good Grips Interlocking Bins on page 71 of the main catalog.
The new 5-Way Plug Adapter on page 71 also looks rather a very useful piece of kit to give you more socket space for all those chargers that we nowadays have to have for all those gadgets and the rechargeable batteries.
The Garden Catalog “Ideas for Spring”, which is combined with the Gift Catalog, is once again a treasure trove for the gardener as to tools, gadgets, and others.
A number of new products are in this Spring's catalog such as the Patio Potato Planter Trio that has one of the planters with a rural Italian scene and will grace any patio.
Also of great interest is the Paper Potter, with which you can turn old newspapers into biodegradable plug pots for your seeds.
The new Wooden Composter found on page 6 of the catalog is also something that should come in handy in many a garden and because of the beauty of its looks will not need to be hidden somewhere in the far back of the garden, as if often done with other composters.
On pages 8 and 9 the food grower will find the Longrow Super Cloche that will protect the plants from the elements and the Garden Grow Tunnels are also a new product with the same aim.
The Slug-Proof Timber Raised Bed with its copper “belt” around it, acting as a barrier against the malevolent molluscs, snails and slugs, is the ideal growing place for all of those plants that those molluscs like to devour. Shame though that one of those things does do nothing against the recent arrival in the UK and which loves to destroy our cabbages, namely the Japanese Beetle.
The Pop-Up Portable Greenhouses also look rather very nice addition to the armory of any gardener who needs to be able to have some kind of instant protection in case of frost from small areas.
All in all the catalog is full of things for the gardener, the one who wants to grow vegetables in the same way as the one who does roses and chrysanthemums and well worth a close peruse.
© 2010
