Showing & Growing

What better start in life can we give our children than a loving, nurturing environment. The same can be said for plants, which is why we like to give them the best organic start using natural products. So when Number1Daycare nursery invited us to show children how to look after their nursery garden, we were over the moon. Any excuse to spread the word on organic gardening, get kids interested from such a young age, get our hands dirty and we're there.

The children watched in fascination as we poured water over the NUGs coir compost discs to make them expand. Then we all got our hands dirty feeling the texture of the compost.

Each child at the nursery was given their own NUGs coir pot. First they added a little of the coir compost, then their daffodil bulb before getting their hands dirty filling their pot with the rest of the compost.

The activity is perfect for young children as it introduces them to gardening, the seasons and the weather. It teaches them to look after and nurture the plant, as well as patience, as they have to wait for them to grow.

"We chose Natural Urban Gardeners pots as we believe in looking after the environment for the future of our children. We did not want to use plastic pots. We love that these pots are made from a natural sustainable source and are much more attractive too," said Number1Daycare owner, Gina Cespedes, "Our core values are love, teaching, care and discipline so we want the children to care about the impact they have on the environment too."

The children then stuck a stick with their name on into their coir pot. Now they will be looking after their plants, eager to see the first shoots and flower bloom in the spring. Then, they will take their pot and daffodil home to share with their families. The daffodil can be planted directly into the garden at home, pot and all. The coir pot will naturally biodegrade feeding the soil around it and the daffodil will come back year-after-year.

"What we love is that we can start off these kids gardening organically. There wasn't a plastic pot in sight here, which is what you see in most gardening activities unfortunately. We also want to spread the word about 'peat-free' compost and gardening responsibly. After all, gardening should be the greenest activity of them all!" said NUGs founder, Rachel.

We had so much fun with the children and team at Number1daycare, a bilingual nursery on the cusp of Earlsfield and Tooting in Wandsworth.

If you are interested in having NUGs come to your nursery, group or school get in touch as we love these events. Contact hi@nugs.com for more information.

We used our NUGs Coir Pots (come in various sizes) and the NUGs Coir Compost Discs (come in bags of 20) with Number1Daycare who will also be using our organic liquid wormcast fertiliser to nurture the daffodils.