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November is the month to plant tulips. There are few things more wonderful in this world than to cradle a tulip bulb in your hand; the rustling wispy-crispy skin and the smooth, slightly clammy flesh. Supremely organised and efficient gardeners

. On Thursday I'm with the twinkling Chris Beardshaw, on Friday with earthy Monty Don and on Saturday and Sunday with gingery Joe Swift. If you're looking for somewhere to go this coming weekend (10-11 May) please come along and say 'hello'.I'm already looking

of colour and life; in the majority of cases this is to be welcomed. Hooray for the resurgence of tulips, whoopee for the return of the rose and yippee for the arrival of annuals.However, there are some plants which I am not looking forward to seeing again

20,000 — so I try to visit as many of them as possible at this time of year. This is partly to see the fruits of all that labour, but also to make notes ready for the next planting season in autumn. Generally, as my family will happily tell you, I am

Scott's tree planting habits).- The Merry Hall Trilogy. I adore these books: beautifully written, light and fluffy sagas about a new garden taken on in the 1950s by novelist Beverley Nichols. He writes very amusingly about people, places, plants and cats

:Tulipa 'Ballerina': so many tulips, almost all of them gorgeous, but as I have to choose, I'll plump for this one. Water-ice-orange, a waist like Grace Kelly and the faintest scent of velvet glove.Bupleurum longifolia: the leaves have a slight blue tinge

last week). It is a good moment to look back on the triumphs and disasters in our gardens and to make notes, so that we do not make the same mistakes again.Allow me to share a few of my best mess-ups of 2010.My first is a mistake I did make last year

stop to our normal November gardening routine. I would usually be spending jolly weekends doing a bit of light tidying, collecting the last of the autumn leaves and planting the last of the tulip bulbs. Instead we have been shoveling snow out

when pricking out.May the mice be so full of cheese that they have no room left to fill up on your tulip bulbs and sweet pea seedlings.May the autumn leaves fall into a neat pile.May your wheelbarrows never get punctures and the handles of your spades