This year, more 208 people contested in the heats of the YHOY competition held at several different venues throughout Ireland. Participating Colleges were: Kildalton College, Cork-IT, IT-Blanchardstown, the National Botanic Gardens including DCU, Greenmount Campus, Bray Institute of Further Education and UCD. It is encouraging to see so many contestants competing for the valuable heat prizes and for the honour of representing their college in the regional final.
The regional final this year took place in Johnstown Garden centre on the Naas Road, on March 13th, 2013. There was a good crowd of about 100 people and Johnstown Garden centre was accommodation us extremely well with making space for us, providing the catering and generally being very friendly and helpful. So thank you very much to Jim Clarke and his team in Johnstown Garden centre.
The Irish Final went very well and we had a clear winner this year in Mark Flahive who ran away from the other contestants within a few rounds, never to be caught up with. Mark was clearly benefitting from his experience the previous year when he also became the Irish Final winner. His final score was 66 points. Runner up with a score of 36 was Michael Dundee from Greenmount Campus, followed closely by Richard Walsh with 33 from the National Botanic Gardens.
The final order of the contestants representing their colleges this year is:
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- Mark Flahive – Open heat entrant, Dublin
- Michael Dundee – CAFRE, Greenmount Campus, N Ireland
- Richard Walsh – National Botanic Gardens, Co. Dublin
- John Scanlon – Kildalton College, Co. Kilkenny
- Eoin Keane – Cork IT, Co. Cork
- Marta Jankowska – IT-Blanchardstown, Co. Dublin
- Conor Bracken – UCD, Co. Dublin
- Philip Peoples – CAFRE, Greenmount Campus, N Ireland
This year the Grand Final of the YHoY will take place in Ness Botanic Gardens near Liverpool on Saturday April 20th, 2013. Here Mark will represent the Irish Branch and compete with the seven winners of the various UK regions, for the title of Young Horticulturist of the year 2013.
Finally on behalf of the Irish Branch of the Institute of Horticulture (IoH), I would like to sincerely thank Bord Bia for their generous support of The Young Horticulturist of the Year (YHoY) Quiz for 2013.
Paul Fitters (YHOY organiser Irish Branch)
Source: HortiTrends News Room
