Living some 30 minutes' walk from the offices of The Garden, I seldom drive to work, unless it is tipping with rain or I have an appointment after work. My walk takes me past the gardens of terraced houses and council flats, through parkland and into town, with various areas of municipal planting.

 

At the beginning of December, I was amazed at what I saw of interest. One small front garden was filled with hardy fuchsias, all in bloom, and looking quite spectacular, while in another stood an 8ft-tall Brugmansia, a bit tattered but still resplendent with huge apricot-coloured trumpets. As you may have guessed, we have had no real frost as yet. A bit further, planted as a street tree, is a small Sorbus, possibly S. vilmorinii, dripping with pinkish-white berries glinting in the morning sun.

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Finding the right place for a choice plant in my garden is becoming increasingly tricky; in some cases I find myself losing sleep over the problem – I lie there, trying to imagine what a plant might look like in a certain spot in two or three years time. Plants I obtain can, in many cases, now expect to wait months if not years before I find the right position or come up with an excuse to get rid of something already in situ.

 

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Peterborough, where I live, is one of those towns where buddleias seem to grow with especially wild abandon, springing up everywhere and becoming a troublesome weed – my neighbours currently have one growing from the wall of their house, 20ft up. However, I love them, especially now: before the first and largest flowerheads fade and look unsightly. A head count in my garden reveals I have eight at the moment. In the front there is an old Buddleja davidii seedling; nothing special, so every year I consider its removal. Then the butterflies arrive and my heart melts – it attracts more than any other buddleia I have, and is the only one on which I have seen hummingbird hawk moths. Is it the plant or the position?

 

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I admit to having a rather relaxed attitude to weeds in my garden – in fact, some I have actively encouraged, even planted. Winter heliotrope (Petasites) is a real thug in my spring border with running roots spreading everywhere and, if allowed, large rounded leaves shading out all that crosses its path. However, I love its fragranced winter flowers and I find it can be easily extracted to prevent it gaining too strong a hold. 

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People who know me and my gardening habits seem a bit surprised, but I have finally boarded the grow-your-own bus. Until now I have always resented putting aside any of my limited border space for fruit or veg, in favour of all the perennials, shrubs and bulbs I love, but the remorseless media onslaught pushing this productive side of gardening has ground me down. When you work on a magazine there is simply no escaping it and, anyhow, I decided I needed to learn more. I’m also a born miser so any chance to save money and I’m there.

The solution for me was to build a raised bed. I have, outside the back of my house, a large expanse of concrete, inherited from the previous owners. It’s not pretty, but would require a huge effort to remove – far better to cover it up somehow. Gales last year blew down some substantial wooden gates that have now been replaced, but the old timber from them – perfectly serviceable – has been put to good use to make the bed. It is not huge, just large enough for some tomatoes, a wigwam of runner beans, a few herbs, some cut-and-come-again salad leaves, and perhaps an aubergine and a few strawberries.

The fact that it is not especially deep (about 70cm) and on solid concrete worries me a little – I have added plenty of hardcore at the base for drainage and the locally-sourced topsoil I have filled it with seems pretty well drained. I will I think just avoid root crops and hope for the best. I have to admit I’m really excited!

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It was tough – with the ground frozen solid, and then under 8 inches of snow – to find anything much to do in the garden during the last couple of months, but as the snow receded my snowdrops emerged in full bloom, quite unblemished. It is the same story with Helleborus x hybridus – for such delicate-looking flowers they have remarkable powers of recovery. It was a relief to see them, and to look forward to everything that is just around the corner, but it has been interesting to see which other plants have stood up well to this cold winter. I am lucky that I have a walled garden close to the centre of a city, so I escape the lowest temperatures (a minimum of -6°c), but those weeks just after Christmas (but before the snow) were the most prolonged cold spell I can remember in ages.

No surprise good old Iris foetidissima is near the top of my list. I split my old plants three years ago, and they sulked for a bit, but now they are terrific – just the right size (before too long they get a bit tatty) – and with several split pods showing plump orange seeds. They grow in some rotten dry shady spots, too: one of my best is by the base of an old Viburnum. I do have the rarer yellow-fruited form but its seeds are never as impressive.

I am impressed also with a similar-looking but more exotic (and tender) plant: Dianella tasmanica ‘Emerald Arch’.

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