Blog

June is the month in the garden where nearly everything is looking its best. Roses should now be in full bloom (especially if you’ve followed my rose pruning guide in the winter), ornamental grasses will be swaying in the breeze and your herbaceous perennials will all be bursting into flower. It’s typically a month where […]

Updated 2024: Flower beds and borders are the staples of any garden, and they come in all shapes and sizes! I get asked all the time for help when it comes to garden design and planting flower beds. Given the endless opportunities, it can seem overwhelming to decide where to start. Most new gardeners simply […]

Plants are incredibly tough, but during heat waves and summer, they may need a bit more assistance in the hydration department. If you’ve recently planted new shrubs, trees, or herbaceous plants, you’ll have to help them out by watering them until they are established. Top 10 Garden Water Saving Hacks If you’ve planted bedding plants, […]

We’ve all become used to popping down to the garden centre when we need new plants. However, thanks to Corona and Covid-19, we are now much more aware of unnecessary commercialism and our gardens. As more of us have been forced to get better acquainted with our outdoor spaces heralding the rise of the ‘accidental […]

I eagerly await April every year as this is the month where the majority of my garden starts to put on rapid growth. It’s a bit like each plant vying for attention to be shortlisted for that staring role! The restrictions from Coronavirus have meant as a Type 1 diabetic that I’m now in week […]

When I first started gardening many moons ago, I never saw the importance of sharpening tools like secateurs. How bad can pruning cuts be from a less-than-perfect set of secateurs? Well, I had a pretty bad experience early on in my career. After using blunt snips on one poor shrub, I subsequently lost it to […]

It’s really worrying times worldwide with the Corona outbreak but as gardeners, we know all too well that there’s plenty of tonics to be found in our gardens. This month I’m concentrating on a number of gardening activities that any gardeners, no matter how experienced can join in with. So if you’re stuck at home […]

I’m a glass half full kinda guy. I try to refuse, where possible, to let myself end up in negative cycles. The media, in particular, like to theme January as the month of personal debasement. To try and amplify the parts of your life you’re not happy with. So much so there’s now a Blue […]

It’s a sad fact that an area the size of the UK is being lost each year worldwide to deforestation. Trees are being felled and cut down at an alarming rate. Now, even local UK councils are stealth tree felling claiming that their ‘maintenance’ costs outweigh trees’ environmental benefits. It’s all too easy for homeowners […]

We seem to have a bit of an issue with pruning as gardeners. I remember when I first started gardening, the thought of cutting off parts of the plants I’d spent ages nurturing felt horrific. I let them grow however and wherever they wanted. Just grateful they were growing. However, this laissez-faire approach always ends […]