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At the extravaganza that was BBC Gardeners' World Live last week, my friend Joe Swift gave a couple of jolly talks about shade-loving plants. During which, I was asked up to the stage several times to help out.We discussed a vast variety of great

is so unexpected and so swift that you're only able to take six plants from your existing garden.So which six plants will you choose? Will you go for something big - a favourite cherry or a noble oak? Maybe an evergreen to liven up your winter? A rose

of muffled hens while others are as small and delicate as the eyelashes of newborn babies. Some flower in May and others in July. Which one should you choose? How do we know which are the best, most reliable plants? It can get a bit confusing, especially when

, let alone a tree - I know of herbaceous plants that achieve that height in a season. It's difficult to choose a tree that is guaranteed not to get any bigger than the height of a short giraffe, but here is a small selection that roughly fits the bill

that once planted, a bamboo will spread like a forest fire and forcibly colonise great chunks of garden. The truth is, as with all things in gardening, that if you choose the wrong plant for your situation then you are setting yourself up for tears

A client of mine said something curious to me this week, as we were discussing what to plant in her newly-landscaped garden: "I hope you're not going to give me any of those ghastly cabbagey things".Strangely, I instantly knew that she was talking

. Like the lives of James Dean or Tupac Shakur, it's short and spectacular. Thereafter, the leaves can be a bit dull and cast a lot of dry shade, so be wary of planting cherries as the sole centrepiece in a small garden. Plant small trees instead

Spring is in the air. Birds are tweeting. Comfortable nests are being flung together. Plants are sprouting. Frogs are croaking lasciviously. Daffodils are flowering away with nothing less than gusto and the gloom of February fades into distant

eventually — after 15 years or so — reach an approximate height of nine metres, so probably aren't trees to choose if you're in a hurry.So all very lovely but, I hear you cry, why should this tree be good enough in early February to warrant a blog post all

are fattening, the earliest pussies are appearing on the willows (faintly interesting fact: in the Sound of Music, Marta - one of the cute kiddies - chooses pussy willow as one of her favourite things) and daffodils are pushing relentlessly upwards. I am not so