Amateur Gardening

Every week, Amateur Gardening is the first choice for both beginners and knowledgeable gardeners looking for advice and easy-to-follow practical features on growing flowers, trees, shrubs as well as fruit and vegetables. Be inspired, by our beautifully illustrated features covering plant and flower groups, both home grown and exotic, and take a sneak peek into some of the most beautiful private gardens around the country. Plus, every week we feature expert opinion and tips from some of gardening’s most influential exponents including Toby Buckland, Bob Flowerdew, Anne Swithinbank, Peter Seabrook and Jo Whittingham.

Editor’s Note

Battling the elements • Ruth looks at ways of dealing with the worst of weather

Winter weather: the three worst offenders • How to protect your gardens from the elements in three practical and easy steps

Monty ruffles some feathers • Celebrity is blasted as ‘ignorant’ by the garden industry

Seeds of change

Give your soil some TLC • Digging over and replenishing will improve it, says Ruth

Sowing in the cold • Some seeds need the cold to germinate well, says Ruth

Fruitful endeavours • One fruit tree can support several cultivars, says Peter

Grow baby salads • Undercover greens provide nourishment and variety in winter. Bob takes a look at growing seedling salads

Last call for garlic • Traditionalists plant it by December 25, says Ruth

Bird Watch: The fieldfare (Turdus pilaris) • Ruth admires this thrush with Anglo-Saxon roots

Times, they are a-changing • Val looks at the vital importance of caring for our planet

Focus on…Blueberries • Sumptuous superfruits guaranteed with Lucy

Correas • They come from Down Under, but in the right conditions Australian fuchsias are perfectly happy growing here. And they offer months of winter colour, says Martyn Cox

Add colour, structure and scent with Midwinter stars • The weather may not be inviting but your garden can still give you a warm glow if you furnish it with plants that perform during the colder months, says Anne Swithinbank

Plants for every pH • Identifying where your garden soil sits on the pH scale is ground zero when it comes to choosing and growing plants that are happy and healthy, says Hazel Sillver

Ask John Negus • John has been answering reader queries for 50 years

A Gardener’s Miscellany • Gardening’s king of trivia and brain-teasers, Graham Clarke

Overwintering pot plants • Tim Rumball offers some tips to save your plants and save you money

ASK ANNE! • Anne Swithinbank’s masterclass on: dahlia dilemma

Letters to Wendy

Amateur Gardening

The steeply sloping garden • A sloping site in a Cheshire market town has truly met its match in determined gardeners David and Melita Turner, who took on the challange, says Sue Bradley

Making the cut • It’s time for the pre-Christmas prune, says Toby, as he looks at why some trees ‘bleed’ when they’re cut