Coleraine's blooming marvellous!

Roger Burnett and Jon Wheatley from the RHS, which hosts the annual Britain in Bloom competition, arrived in town on Wednesday for a tour which took in the Rose Garden, Andersons Park, Coleraine Town Centre, Christie Park, Pates Lane, Somerset, Ballysally Community Centre and the University grounds.

The judges spent three hours travelling around the pre-planned tour route making notes, taking pictures and speaking to Council Officers, voluntary representatives and members of the local community.

Entries into the Britain in Bloom competition, which is affectionately known as the Oscars of community gardening, come from villages, towns and cities from throughout the UK.

As well as Coleraine, Northern Ireland's other entries into this year's competition are from Londonderry, Bangor, Ahoghill and Scarva. Coleraine gained its position in the large town category of the competition after coming out tops in the 2009 Translink Ulster in Bloom Awards.

Speaking after the judging Paul Jess from Parks Nursery, said: "Although the judges will reserve their comments to the awards ceremony in September we got the sense that they were really impressed with Coleraine. One of the judges was quite taken aback by our hanging baskets in the town centre saying he'd never seen ones so prominent and blooming.

"The judges will now go back and deliberate on various aspects that they were marking us on, such as the cleanliness of the environment, our sustainable development efforts, community involvement in Coleraine and of course our floral displays and beds. We will find out the outcome on 29th September."