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With the fruit swelling on your strawberries it's time to protect them and cover the soil around the plants with a mulch. This will prevent the crop getting splashed with mud when it rains. And don't forget to net the plants against birds and keep

mixture of bog-standard and rare varieties - which are now strapping adolescents, producing more and more fruit each year. It's been one of the most satisfying things we've done in this garden and has, generally, been a success. Although there is one

. While I was there I thought I may as well do a couple of jobs, so I set about thinning out the fruit on the apple trees. This year my three apple trees have flowered and set fruit beautifully; the branches are laden with bunches of marble-sized fruits

Stone me!This is THE year for fruit as far as I'm concerned. About five years ago we started our own mini-orchard with some great bare root fruit trees from a local fruit nursery. Then we added to them over the next year or two. Despite the fact

It's great. The canes on my autumn-fruiting rasperries are whipping around in the incredible wind we're having, but they're absolutely laden with fruit. It's amazing that the local bird population isn't all lined up underneath with their beaks open

It's not every year I manage it, but this year we were tipped the wink that a local chap had a good source of quality manure. And just in time to spread some around my fruit.A few years ago I had a huge trailer load of manure delivered, only

, so a gorgeous-looking plant that also produces fruit scores double points. Prunus spinosa is commonly known as blackthorn, and produces wonderful sloe berries in autumn that I use to make my sloe gin. I've still got a little left, but have made a

spectacle of an ancient and gnarled tree, but of the chin dribbling-deliciousness of a ripe mulberry fruit. Those who have eaten mulberries will know exactly what I mean; those who have never tried them are really missing a trick. Mulberries are bigger

on special occasions, religiously eat my five portions of fruit and veg every day and get super-fit. And the allotment fits in very nicely with the last two of those.Trouble is that in conjunction with the month of January there usually comes a settled

-tinged blossom - far prettier than many ornamental trees.It's a real delight to see fruit trees right now as they're breathtakingly beautiful. I can't help wondering why more people don't grow tree fruit. There is the misconception that it requires acres of space