There’s a hands-on horticultural way to mitigate climate change – but it will only make a real difference if our gardens aren’t also part of the problem.

A delight with any greenhouse or conservatory is to have the air full of that most delicious perfume Jasmine. Also known as (Sweet) Jessamine. Or rather perfumes for there are dozens of species and varieties, some hardy and many others that really need to be under glass. The hardier ones prefer to ramble and given […]

My greenhouse gets pretty gruesome towards the end of the season. Mine had become quite off-puttingly jungly, filled with collapsed stems, rotten tomatoes and a thriving community of snails. So the other morning I poured myself a big, steaming mug of tea (soon with added sprinkling of compost), rolled up my sleeves and had the […]

What – its December already? I can’t believe it!  It seems that time passes more rapidly every year. Perhaps it’s my age – surely not; it’s just that there is so much to do and so little time! November was an extraordinary month, with bouts of unseasonal temperatures, which made it feel like spring. I […]

How to Growing Tomatoes httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e0u5UzV1MWI If you have any questions please leave a comment below, or alternatively on our YouTube Channel  Below is a Transcript of this video Growing tomatoes is a very profitable thing to do and very easy. I recommend it if you haven’t grown many vegetables before. It all starts off in February […]

It’s been a mellow and mild autumn, and I have been tricked into not quite believing it would ever turn cold. This is a handy state of denial if you own a greenhouse, as lining the walls and doors for winter is truly one of the dullest jobs of the year: hours of painstaking fiddling […]

The magic of seeds never fails to inspire me. You start with a (usually) brown, wizened hard capsule of some sort and within days, weeks, months or years, an almost exact replica of the parent plant reaches maturity and makes its own fruit and seed. Some seeds such as salads, brassicas, peas and beans, germinate […]

Of all the flowers to grow in a greenhouse Hibiscus rosa-sinensis are probably the most imposing. If you’ve ever been lucky enough to have a tropical vacation you will have noticed hotels often have table displays of hibiscus flowers. The reason they’re so often used for cut flowers is their endurance as unlike most other […]

Now’s the time to plant garlic. The year before last, my garlic was successful and my onions were not. This year is has been the other way round! They were both planted at the same time and treated in the same way but the results are different! It is interesting how success and failure are […]

Going peat-free is essential in an earth-friendly garden, but there’s more: the compost you use needs to be a truly renewable fuel. Coaxing a steep, bracken-riddled bank of acidic, nutrient-poor soil into a structured, productive garden might sound challenging enough. But imagine setting out to do it in a deliberate, thoughtful way where your guiding […]

Following on from my late sowing theme last month, I’m not sure whether sowing winter salads constitutes late sowing for this year or early sowing for next, but since it is a ploy to provide winter salads all year round I don’t think it really matters. Just because it’s October doesn’t mean that sowing and […]

Little did I know, when writing last month’s diary, expressing my hopes for an ‘Indian Summer’, it would manifest itself in record breaking temperatures at the end of the month and 29.9C at Gravesend on the first of October! It has thrown plants into confusion, I am not alone in having fruit trees, like the […]