It amazes me how much all this white stuff makes everything look so different. The layer of snow and ice on the land really highlights to me how much plants give shape and structure to the landscape around us. I wonder how many of us really appreciate how much the look and feel of our outdoor spaces are influenced by the trees and shrubs we choose to use.

I think of evergreen shrubs as the walls and paint of our gardens, a soft framework to give year round permanence and to establish the feel of the garden.

Deciduous shrubs enhance this structure but can change the look we achieve seasonally. They look different when the leaves grow, when they flower, when the leaves change colour and prepare to fall in autumn and when they finally fall in winter revealing the shapes and 

colour of the stems and bark.

Trees can extend our look upward. Many people choose a tree to gain privacy but they can also be used to frame views and change light levels through the shade they offer.

Hedges can guide us round paths and offer a frame to borders to set off the brighter flowers inside.

Next time you’re in your garden or out and about have a look round and take a moment to appreciate the plants we don’t always notice but really influence how our outdoor spaces look and feel.

 

Well to state the blooming obvious it’s gone a wee bit cold out there. Still, it’s lovely to see a bit of sun, much nicer than that wet stuff we’ve been putting up with for so long now. We’re seeing a lot of you out getting stocked up on bird food which they really need at this time of year but birds (and other creatures) also need access to fresh water so don’t forget to knock the ice off bird baths and ponds so they can get to it.

In the centres this week we’re taking delivery of summer flowering bulbs - Dahlias, Begonias, Gladiolus and all the other bright and blowsy bits that add some cheer to your garden in the summer. I’m going to pop a few Dahlias in my patio pots again this year but I want to go for a full-on bright clash of Yellow, Orange and Pink for maximum effect this year.

We’ve also got a fantastic new range of Marshalls vegetable seeds in at John Browns and Cadnam. These seeds are well known to allotment gardeners as a proper old fashioned seed company that pride themselves on quality and varieties that really perform well. I’m certainly going to try a few in my veg beds as soon as it warms up a bit and I’m really pleased to be able to offer such a respected and trusted brand to our customers.

Happy new year to you all!

I love the promise of a new year in the garden, bulbs are starting to nose through and the promise of what’s to come hangs in the air as the days get longer. This year especially as last year was such a bad one for us gardeners – I have put a request in for lots of sunshine and when it rains for it to do so at night so it doesn’t stop us getting out there... We’ll see!

Our manager at Cadnam was very excited to receive a visit from a Waxwing last week. These birds overwinter on the east coast of Britain migrating from Scandinavia and it’s apparently very unusual to see them this far across the country.

Waxwings love berries and many plants didn’t produce enough flowers in the awful spring we had last year so consequently there are less berries. Reports say this was worse in Scandinavia then here. The birds tend to move further inland as the winter goes on and food sources get scarcer so this may be why we were lucky enough to see one.