At this time of year many of us get the gardening bug, whether it’s vegetable plants or pollinator friendly flowers, we dig the trowel out of the shed and make ourselves busy.

However, gardening can quickly loose its glamour, the thought of meandering about the greenhouse generously watering plants, goes completely out the window when there is the odd downpour, or if you find your seeds have failed to spring to life after weeks of tender love and care. Even if you do manage to make it past the first hurdle, you then have to protect young plants from evil seed hungry birds, at the same time as single handedly monitoring climate change. If you’re not careful, it can leave you feeling like you’ve taken on a second career as Alan Titchmarsh’s apprentice.

So, what can you do to make it easier on yourself? Well, the hardest part is getting the seeds to grow in the first place, after that then it’s just a case of keeping them alive.  I think its perfectly acceptable to take a shortcut every now and then, so why not let someone else do the hard part for you? Get yourself down to Surrey Markets one weekend, where help is on hand in the form of Special Plants Ltd.

Adam and Indy Berthoud run Special Plants Ltd, they offer a range of strong, robust and weather resilient plants, all grown with care directly from seed. Also on offer is selection of flowers or vegetables, which are ready to plant in the garden straight away, which is great, if like me, you’ve left it a little too late to start from scratch. Special Plants Ltd can offer advice on aftercare, planting and feeding to ensure your garden always looks its best.

With all the time you’ll free up, why pick up on another hobby? Collect up all your garden waste, out of date grow bags, kitchen leftovers and get composting.