MAKE BEST USE OF AVAILABLE SPACE – WITH TOM PATTINSON

Thankfully, a lack of outdoor space or state-of-the-art growing facilities need not be a barrier to getting a few early treats edible or ornamental under way.

Gardening containers come in all shapes and sizes, and they are your starting point.

A window box or hanging basket can be a home to hardy winter herbs – rosemary, sage, and thyme spring to mind. Winter heathers, Erica carnea varieties in pink, white and red, currently illuminate our garden and stone troughs.

Alternatively, try colourful dwarf shrubs and spring bedding plants, some of which are performing now.

Get the best from some containers by planning relevant plants for each season. For example, in a deep container, dwarf narcissi can be permanent residents, popping up annually to accompany spring bedding. They remain during the May/June divide when summer plants are introduced, and benefit from the refreshing organic blood, fish and bone feed offered.

Remaining containers can become permanent hosts.

There are a whole range of dwarf bush and tree fruits specially developed for confined spaces.

The idea of a mini orchard on your patio that allows the picking of apples and pears, raspberries, gooseberries, blueberries, and currants, can become a reality. Itching to get started on early treats, I’ve used straw from the horse’s bed, stuffed it into a huge pot and inverted it over the rhubarb patch.

We’ve also dug up, trimmed, and potted a few strawberry plants that stand on the unheated greenhouse staging.

Given the relative shelter and warmth, new growth will soon appear, and ripe fruits are pencilled in for early June.

Last week, the max/min thermometer recorded minus 2 Celsius yet we’re still picking fresh leaf lettuce ‘Salad Bowl’ from a crop in the border!