Search - Articles

and was rewarded with the sight of Ledra aurita, a large and curiously shaped plant-hopper I'd never seen before. When I say large, I mean 15-18 mm long, so you can imagine how small most of the others are. It is immediately identified by the two large, broad, flat

Is your garden stimulating all your senses? Like many people, I'm sure, the main driving factors behind my choice of plants are colour, size and shape. In other words, I'm most interested in what they look like. Nothing wrong with that. I want my

foliage. Height/spread 1.2m x 90cm.Corsican hellebore, Helleborus argutifoliusDespite its name, it's not that likely to flower for Christmas - more usually seen flowering from late-winter. Flowers are white, though sometimes flushed pink, and flat

and spread of 2m x 40cm.Climbing beansHybrid varieties of the Lenten rose, Hellebore orientalis produce large clusters of saucer-shaped flowers in a variety of colours from midwinter to mid-spring. They prefer full sun to part shade and grow to a height

's made up of very fine particles. It rolls into a ball easily and stays in shape.Clay soilLoam is the perfect soil type, as it's easy to work, is not too free draining or prone to waterlogging, and is packed with nutrients. It also warms up quickly

).This hedge was originally in a garden I built at Chelsea in 1999 and has been through a number of incarnations. At the moment I have clipped it (or rather, Simon has) in a strange swooping and rearing shape that I think goes rather well with the Stipa

with daffodils in an almost unquenchable variety of shapes and colours, almost all of them shades of yellow. Given the joys of this or this or this or (almost) any one of the 20,000 available varieties, why choose a forsythia for your spring hit of yellow?It also

perfectly suited to the smaller garden. It has pure white star-shaped (hence the name 'stellata' as in 'constellation') flowers. It grows very slowly and will reach only about 1.5m after 10 years: given perfect conditions it will eventually top out at about

into the shape of a flower and glue them in place, one at a time.When dry, push a skewer through the centre of your arrangement to make a hole.Push the stem of the seed head through the hole and glue it in place at the base.Spray the decoration and allow

should be able to buy all the ingredients for your plant support from a garden centre or DIY store for less than £10.Galvanised wire1.5m bamboo cane45cm terracotta potWire cuttersCompostIvy plantall year round30 minutesCut a 3m length of wire and bend