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This year I'm determined to only grow one variety of tomato. This is because my garden was overrun with tomato plants last year and I couldn't get onto my patio for growing bags and poorly staked cordons. So 2011 will see a more streamlined effort

).It's not just my friends, I once viewed a flat and the prospective landlady pulled out a dead tomato plant that had been growing on her window sill, asking me why it hadn't fruited. From what I could tell it was a cordon type and was planted in a 10cm diameter

There's a mouse living in my compost bin. I first saw it one evening the other week, when I added a fresh layer of tomato side shoots and yellowing leaves. It leapt out of the bin and charged through the border. That frog looks just like a mouse, I

To celebrate Gardeners' World Magazine's Harvest Week, running from 12-18 September, I thought I'd share a few of my favourite easy harvest recipes. One of them is a salad - so isn't technically a recipe - but it's so good it's worth a mention

the dead bits of rosemary and hope it pulls through.In the meantime, my annual herbs (basil, coriander and flat-leaf parsley) are coming on well. These I grow in grow bags with the tomatoes, along with more chives (which I once read can help improve

I've just thrown a 'plant party', as part of 'Grow Your Own' Week. This involved my friends coming to my flat and learning how to sow tomatoes and chillies. We also discussed pricking out, transplanting, feeding and watering. It reminded me of my

Last year I sowed all my seeds in the first week of January, eager to get my brand new garden off to a flying start. Everything was sown at once - from Eryngium leavenworthii to tomato 'Gardener's Delight' and my front room looked like a badly run

, and I'm looking forward to several more over the next few weeks.There are many ways to keep fruiting crops (beans, peas, tomatoes, chillies) productive. The obvious one is to keep feeding them. These plants need extra nutrients once they've finished

frogs poking their heads out two months later, when watering my tomatoes.In autumn, determined that the frogs and insects would have a safe place to spend the winter, I left the grow bag in place, cutting down the tomato haulms and placing them and other

the plants will catch up, but I might not get a harvest until August. My spinach hasn't fared any better - that was eaten by snails.It's not all bad news. My tomatoes and chillies in pots are doing well and the cut-and-come-again lettuce leaves have already