Garden Expo set to bloom in Auckland

Puzzled about how to grow peonies? Want to make the most of seasonal produce? Head to the Ellerslie Race Course for the New Zealand Garden Expo from April 8-10 to have all your gardening and culinary questions answered.

Home-grown gardening and cooking experts will share their handy tips, advice and secrets on ways to improve your cooking and gardening skills. Whether you have a quarter acre or a courtyard, the Garden Expo can help you design the perfect garden.

Avid horticulturalists, landscape designers, florists and chefs are among the variety of experts who will take to the stage for live demonstrations and gardening education sessions.

Four different areas will be set up and abuzz throughout the day, as each expert takes to the stage.

The first area is the Ask It, Solve It stage brought to you by Your Home & Garden magazine. This is an informal, intimate Q&A panel format featuring some of the magazine’s writers and contributors talking about specific plant care and answering gardening questions. So if you have a problem that needs solving, or want some advice for your garden, this is the stage for you.

For practical gardening advice, pay a visit to The Potting Shed, proudly supported by Weekend Gardener. The audience will get the chance to get involved with hands-on participation with the gardening experts and learn the fundamentals of key gardening skills such as propagating from seed, roots or cuttings, grafting, re-potting, tool maintenance, pruning and transplanting.

Discover the wacky and wonderful creatures that share your garden at the Backyard Creatures area. Visitors will be able to learn how they can attract the creatures and native birds they want into their garden (including how to keep bees or chickens) and keep out the pests they don’t want. Special guests from Butterfly Creek and Auckland Zoo will be on hand to guide people through the living, breathing ecosystem that is your garden.

And finally the Taste Cooking Stage – the perfect place to learn how to take the seasonal fruits and veggies of your garden and turn them into delicious dishes. Be inspired to whip up a feast from your own garden as Taste Magazine’s chefs, cooking experts, famous culinary personalities and exhibitors show easy, hands-on cooking techniques that you can try at home.

Household names like Julie Biuso, Sean Armstrong, founder of artisan bakery Loaf, and MasterChef New Zealand runner-up Kelly Young will whip up a fine selection of culinary delights at the Taste Cooking Stage.

For the budding gardeners, the country’s leading parent magazine Little Treasures is proud to sponsor the Kids’ Activity area. Littlies are welcome to participate in the fun activities and programmes on offer throughout the day while the grown-ups enjoy the expo.

The Garden Expo is all about a hands-on approach where gardeners of any level can get practical solutions to their gardening problems or experience the new cutting-edge innovations in the gardening industry. The show will feature gardens and floral displays that will inspire you to get digging and creating. There is also the opportunity buy plants and products for your own patch.

This is the first time the New Zealand Garden Expo has been held on this side of the Tasman, with Australians enjoying the expo for the past 20 years. Event organiser Gary Fitz-Roy says the expo will be packed with practical advice visitors can apply at home.

“The size of your garden and budget are no barriers to the gardening and cooking tips visitors can expect to pick up at the expo. This is an event that will inspire and entertain, and will appeal to all demographics,” he says.

Woman’s Day magazine is hoping to make the day even better by offering FREE parking at the expo for all visitors.

No matter if you’re a greenhorn or have a bona fide green thumb, there will be something for everyone at the Garden Expo.

www.gardenexpo.co.nz

What: New Zealand Garden Expo 2011
Where: Ellerslie Race Course
When: 8-10 April, Open 10am - 4.30pm daily
Tickets: Adults $16, Seniors $14, Children (5-16yrs) $6