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. But it is still well worth growing as the blossom is truly sensational and the leaves turn the colour of plums and bruised cranberries. It gets to about 15m which is bigger than the others, so perhaps your small garden had better not be too small.Maybe I'll think

Plants for small gardensSmall gardens can accommodate a wide range of plants, from spring bulbs to small trees. We spoke to Monty Don and James Alexander-Sinclair at Gardeners' World Live to discover their top 10 plants for small gardens.A small

A few weeks ago I wrote about trees for small gardens. Among the comments (well, to be honest, 33% of the comments) was a request from Daphne for very, very small trees - "very small being up to three metres".Tricky. Three metres is barely a shrub

the year. It can reach a height of 10m.Prunus serrula, Tibetan cherryFeatured in Toby Buckland's gold medal-winning Ethical garden at BBC Gardeners' World Live 2008, Eriobotrya japonica is a small tree with large, evergreen leaves. Grown in a sheltered

is the ideal time to plant bare-rooted trees and there are few simple ways to give them the best start. Tree, tree tieCane, stringSpade, forkWooden stakeHammer, sawCompost, granular fertiliser, well-rotted manureMulch or bark chippingsNovember - February1 hour

garden is really too small then plant them in somebody else's (if necessary under cover of darkness).Update: read James's follow-up blog on trees for small gardens, Trees for small gardens 2.

.An inspiring book I often turn to for ideas is a small paperback by Joy Larkcom called Vegetables from Small Gardens, first published in 1976 – I'm not even sure if it's still in print. Joy introduced me to a lovely concept – the Value for Space Rating (VSR

. Their root systems become inseparable. Very romantic. I engineered a similar occurrence here by planting three birch saplings together and then plaiting them: now, 12 years later, they have grown into one rather singular tree.If I might wander off in a new

are getting ready for the big planting session after half-term.There are precious few bugs about still. A small cloud of diaphanous winter gnats flutters above the shed but all else is quiet, until I pull up a small groundsel plant. There, wriggling

small picture-winged fly, Rhagoletis meigenii (pictured above), in London's Battersea Park in June 2000. At the time this pretty little insect was thought to feed on the native Berberis vulgaris, but was believed to be extinct in Britain, having been