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Much of my gardening time in September is spent planning for spring colour. I'm not wishing the year away - I love autumn in all its fading glory - but now is the time to buy spring-flowering bulbs for planting over the next couple of months

interest in 'flower viewing" (hanami, in Japanese), with special alerts on television to tell people where the trees are flowering. As in this country, flowering begins earlier in the warmer south and slowly tracks northwards.There's a great deal

the drive and while I have been away it has burst into flower. Cow parsley (or Anthriscus sylvestris to give it its posh Latin name) is a pretty biennial* native plant that scatters itself along roadsides and hedgerows.I learned from reading a fine blog

, while others have flooded. No wonder the plants are confused.In September, the RHS reported that the unseasonably warm weather was causing plants to flower later than usual, sometimes causing them to bloom again. This was down to climate change

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

is to blame, with wild areas of farmland sacrificed for bigger yields. Bumblebees now have fewer nesting opportunities and flowers to feed from.Grow a range of flowering plants all year - especially from March to November when bees are most active - to provide

The sun is shining and the daffodils are out. Nothing spells the start of spring like a mass of golden, trumpet-shaped narcissi.Among the flowering daffodils are some that are only producing foliage. These ‘blind’ daffodils, either side

, rather than flowers. Nothing surprising so far - many plants need to get established and fill their pots before settling down into a regular flowering routine. To get agapanthus to flower well you must almost ignore them. They need to become pot bound, so

encourages flowers to form at the base of each of these pruned shoots.I regularly hear of people whose wisteria won't flower, but my plant flowers very reliably. Perhaps growing it in a pot helps, along with correct pruning, and feeding with a high potash

and is planted by the washing line. The open flowers have a beautiful jam coloured splodge in their centres. The other, Philadelphus 'Manteau d'Hermine', is only about a metre or so tall, with less open - but still scented - flowers.Others not to be sneezed