Readers’ gardens

Over the

I’m always excited at the start of a new gardening year with the thrill of growing plants, some new to me, and the promise of a garden full of flowers, fruit and veggies. This year I’m hoping to make the garden even more nature friendly. We do have nest boxes, bug boxes, a hedgehog house, bird baths, a pond and a couple of years ago a friend gave me a good slice of tree trunk that I’ve placed in among the ferns along the shady part of the path which leads down the garden. I hope lots of insects are using it and I’d love to see some stag beetles living in it.

A few years ago, in my son’s garden, there was part of a tree trunk being used as a table base and my son discovered three huge stag beetle larvae in it. I also want to find places in the garden to plant more shrubs with berries.

I’ve ordered all my seeds and plants for this year. I decided to go with the saying ‘if it isn’t broken, don’t fix it’ as I love the plants I grow in the bedding borders. I’ll be growing the usual but with a variation in colour. I’ve chosen white marguerites, pink-blush cosmos, yellow antirrhinums, skyblue petunias, vanilla marigolds, ageratum, laurentia and violet impatiens. I also made the big decision to grow most of them from seed. I usually buy plug plants.

Walking round the garden it’s so lovely to see new growth emerging now. Primroses and pansies are starting to flower and the Viburnum bodnantense smells lovely. I think the Chimonanthus praecox will soon be in flower, too.

My pond area is a picture Bright primroses blooming

Sorting labels and choosing plants

Despite it being February, there's still a lot of interest

A Surrey garden that uses every inch of space for year-round colour and interest.