We're falling head over heels for reliable roses

WITH Valentine’s Day this weekend, supermarkets and florists will be selling huge quantities of flowers.

- DIARMUID GAVIN

Around 570 tons of roses are imported into the UK in February, most from Kenya and Colombia with the remaining 20% arriving from Holland.With the rise in energy costs, the price of producing bouquet-perfect roses has spiked. They need to be grown in regulated conditions, requiring water, temperature control and chemicals, then flown worldwide.

This raises environmental concerns and it is extra frustrating as we can grow roses so well here, just not in time for February 14.