City nursery prepares for explosion of summer blooms with robot's help

Two million spring and summer plants are being potted by a state-of-the-art robot at the Arium, in preparation for being planted across the city.

- by Harriet Sutton

The Leeds City Council-run garden centre and plant nursery is the largest local authority nursery in the country.

Most of the plants they sell are grown in the massive 19,000 square metre glasshouses on the premises, and the site provides flowers and plants to be displayed across Leeds.

A council spokesperson said: "How they manage to get millions of plants ready to bring springtime to the city is thanks to the state-of-the-art potting robot that has been in place since 2017.

"Working wirelessly, the robot lifts young plants from their seed tray and pots them into their final tray in one action.

"The plants will soon be in bloom across Leeds in the city's parks, roundabouts and flowerbeds."