Beware the ides of March!

And beware the ides of February, too, for that matter!

Gardeners who have been lulled into a false sense of security, with roses still blooming late as January and February which is very unusual and other plants starting to put on growth, tricked into thinking that the spring is already here.

Wiser, older gardeners will not be fooled, however! It is not unknown for a very mild winter to be met by the teeth some very inclement weather , with snow having fallen as late as May Fifteenth in recent times.

So, how can we protect our plants should we get severe February and March wintery weather? Make sure that vulnerable plants are mulched properly. Trees and other plants in outside containers can be mulched and bubble wrap makes an ideal cover to help keep the worst of the frosts away from plants that need a little bit of tender loving care.

If you have a greenhouse, make sure that the heating (if you have any) is working, even late into the season. "Never cast a clout 'til May is out" is a saying that every gardener should remember, as frosts -and even snow, sometimes- is not a stranger to May. If you don't have heating, bubble wrap and mulch also works well in a greenhouse or a cold frame.

Save your water save your money!

If you are on a water meter and you need to water your garden, you can help save money by using so-called grey water for watering plants.

If you wash vegetables before cooking them, save that water in a bucket. Got some tea or coffee left in the pot?

Add that to the bucket, too! You can also use washing up water, but some gardeners reckon you should only use this if you buy eco-friendly washing up liquid, but it's up to you. If it works for you, then that's fine!

You can use this water direct from the bucket or you can put it in a watering can, though you'll have to ensure tea leaves, etc., don't block the holes if you have a rose on the spout!

Re-launched That's Gardening

Welcome to a re-launched That's Gardening.

Over the coming months there will be articles on gardening, book reviews, tests and trials of seeds and tools, recipes and much, much more besides.

And you can now read That's Gardening in your own language, thanks to Google Translate.

Happy gardening!

Chas and His Rock and Roll Allotment

Chas Hodges (Chas of Chas and Dave fame) isn't only a rock and roll pianist; he's also a keen allotment gardener. It's short for a gardening book, 112 pages. Chas thinks many gardening authors pad their books.

Although short on words, it's rich with advice on how to be an allotment gardener.

He helps novices believe they can grow vegetables for the table. He provides information on what tools you'll need and which tools you don't.

He gives tips on digging, how to keep chickens, what crops to try and what to avoid. There's some useful tips on pickling, too. The book touches on the triumphs and tragedies of Chas' East End family. And beer!

It's introduced by Jools Holland OBE, with a plea for more people to grow their own vegetables like Chas.

Thinking of buying this book as a present, be aware Chas uses swearwords to a prodigious, nay, industrial degree!

It's the first gardening book I have read with a language warning!

And one of the few that made me think: "I could do that!" (Apex, www.apexpublishing.co.uk £9.99.)

Plant Me Now launches exciting premium summer bedding plant range

With much of Britain basking in temperatures of over 20°C last week, the danger of frost has passed at last and it’s time to get outside and plant your garden for the summer!

Unique online garden centre Plant Me Now has worked closely with the top breeders of summer bedding plants to find varieties that offer brighter colours, longer flowering times and better weather tolerance.

After trialling and testing thousands of varieties, the best 150 are now available to buy online. Plant Me Now’s gardening consultant, Tim Milward, gives his top five tips for getting the most from your bedding plants:

1. Bedding plants are a great way to add instant colour to a garden as they're low-cost, fast-growing and have long flowering periods. At the end of the season, replace them with winter flowering bedding for a colourful outdoor space all year round.

2. Summer bedding plants make great gap fillers in flowerbeds but also work brilliantly in hanging baskets and containers where you can mix a combination of upright and trailing varieties. Adding a taller plant like a fuchsia or dahlia as a centrepiece creates a great focal point, while mixing bright, bold, large flowers with smaller, subtler lighter flowers gives a stunning effect.

3. Attract bees and butterflies by choosing brightly coloured, large flowering bedding plants. Bees like to get to the centre of the flower so avoid 'double' flowers and plant bedding with 'daisy-like' flowers instead. Bright orange and yellow flowers attract pests like aphids, so planting marigolds or nasturtiums on an allotment will draw aphids away from your valuable vegetable plants.

4. Water bedding plants first thing in the morning or early evening to ensure you avoid watering in bright sunlight. Deadhead regularly and remove faded flowers – this way nutrients the plants are taking in will be used to produce new flowers rather than feeding finished ones. Choosing a food that's high in potash will help promote flowering, while nitrogen will encourage the plants to get large and bushy. Get quick results by feeding regularly with a liquid or soluble feed, or use a slow-release feed once at the beginning of the season.

5. Most bedding plants will have been grown in greenhouses from around March. The low light levels this year have caused flowers to be a little late and if the greenhouse is unheated then growth may be behind by a few weeks. Don’t panic if you have no flowers yet – a week or two of June sunshine should easily help the plants catch up if they’re behind.

Tim adds: “At Plant Me Now we've put together a range of ready-to-plant summer bedding plants that are going to perform fantastically, including varieties that are now available in the UK for the very first time. All ‘premium’ ranges arrive in a 7cm pot and are ready to burst into flower right away. Unlike traditional plug plants, our 'must have' range are grown in a glued plug – this helps hold the compost together and protect delicate roots while retaining water for longer so they arrive with customers in the same condition they were sent out.”

If you need advice on what to choose for your garden, Plant Me Now’s team of horticultural experts can help you find the right plants. You can call them on the phone, or use email, Facebook or Twitter – visit www.plantmenow.co.uk for details.

Bring your garden indoors and create a conservatory oasis this winter

Anglian winter conservatory

Winter tends to be a relatively quiet time of year for many gardeners, but if you are lucky enough to have a conservatory, why not create a lush, tropical indoor oasis and bring plants in from the garden to add bright, natural colours and designs into your home during the winter?

A conservatory, or even a window sill, provides a perfect shelter from frost where you can over-winter your tender plants such as begonias, herbs and heat loving Mediterranean varieties including fig, olive, orange and lemon.

Or take the advice given in Gardeners’ World TV presenter Carol Klein’s new book, where she recommends growing chillies indoors in a greenhouse, conservatory or windowsill in the months leading up to Christmas.

She says, “Chillies look fabulous, with their red, orange, yellow – even purple – fruits dangling like Christmas baubles, and they make very decorative houseplants as long as they can get enough light, but I grow them because I have come to love to eat the fruits.”

Bringing fragrant leaves such as Calycanthus into your home is another way to make your house smell wonderful and keep your spirits up as the winter closes in.

Head of Marketing and Communications at Anglian Home Improvements, Melanie McDonald, says, “Modern conservatories are much better insulated than many of the older designs, which allows homeowners to use them all year round for a wide range of purposes. Many of Anglian’s customers are keen gardeners and use their conservatories as an extension of their garden as well as home throughout the seasons. In addition to providing winter protection for plants and a perfect place in which to start off spring bulbs, the colours and perfumes that can be brought into the house are a real bonus at this time of year, plus you get the benefit of being able to enjoy some of the results in your cooking as well.”

Anglian Home Improvements is the UK’s biggest double glazing window, door and conservatory specialist. Its range of traditional and contemporary conservatories, including an orangery and conservatory verandah, are all made in the UK using the most up-to-date uPVC conservatory manufacturing and construction techniques.

Squrrels driving you nuts?

Haith’s, The Bird Food Specialist - Public Relations

If you feed the birds, Grey Squirrels are probably the bane of your life. They will not only steal all the food, they will probably destroy expensive bird feeders, many of which may claim to be "squirrel resistant". Very few are!

TV Broadcaster and Britain’s favourite bird food chef, Bill Oddie admits, it’s hard – but not impossible - to beat the Grey Squirrel: “A friend of mine once designed and then built a home-made bird table. He was very proud of it, especially when it was almost immediately visited by birds. Unfortunately, it was soon also invaded by Grey Squirrels. He immediately resolved to invent a deterrent.”

“He started by simply moving the table further from his hedgerow. No good. Squirrels can leap a very long way. Then he tried fixing a sort of circular baffle under the table. The squirrels fell off a few times, but soon clambered over it, and then chewed it to bits.”

“Next, he fitted a length of piping over the pole, under the table, suspended on springs. He figured that the squirrels might be able to scramble over it, but at least he'd have the satisfaction of seeing the pipe spring back and whack them on their behinds! The last I heard, the squirrels had stretched the springs so far that they didn't spring any more. They had eaten all the bird food, and my friend decided to build a new Hi Fi cabinet instead!”

So, are any of these squirrel resistant feeders really squirrel resistant?

“Well, I've tried them all,” says Bill Oddie “and so have my garden Greys! I'd say that most of them work, most of the time, but there's no denying the squirrels ingenuity or tenacity, and you almost have to admire them for it.”

“One thing you do have to accept is that many of these contraptions look more like flying saucers, space rockets or pieces of modern sculpture than bird feeders. I can't say they exactly blend in with the concept of an old fashioned rustic garden! But if you do have a squirrel problem, Haith’s the bird food specialist have a range of squirrel resistant feeders and you really have to try them. It's no coincidence, by the way, that many of the most successful squirrel resistant designs come from America, which is of course where Grey Squirrels actually belong (they were introduced into England early in the twentieth century, 'cos someone thought they were cute. Oops!)

Haith’s - the bird food specialist - have a high-quality range of squirrel resistant bird feeders and SUPERCLEAN™ bird foods online at www.haiths.com and Bill Oddie’s Bird Food Recipes can be found in the pet aisle at ASDA, Sainsbury’s, Wilkinson and Waitrose - see www.billsbirdfood.co.uk for more information.