The importance of feeding summer container displays is obvious – hungry summer bedding plants quickly use up the nutrients within their compost. In a usual winter, feeding of seasonal bedding containers is usually not needed, particularly when using a compost from the West+ range – all have 4 month’s worth of feed added to them. Slower growth in winter means plants, even those that flower at this time of year, will make do with what is in the compost. 

However, we’re not having a usual winter! Heavy rain in the last month is likely to have washed nutrients though container compost and mild temperatures mean plants are putting on more growth this winter than is usual.

If we want our winter bedding containers to carry on into spring, it’s worth offering your pots of pansies, violas, primroses and the like a feed now to ensure healthy vigorous plants until April/May.

Apply a liquid feed such as Nutri All Purpose Plant Food for a fast fix, but if more rain is to follow (more than likely!) a slow release option may be better, as liquid feeds are flushed through compost much faster than granular/pelleted feeds. Nutri Slow Release Plant Food, will continue to feed plants for up to six months. The granules offer fast release feed for immediate impact, then continue to release nutrients, increasing in rate as temperatures warm up as we move towards spring. Simple add a sprinkling to the compost surface and mix in.

If you’re like me, you are only just venturing out into the garden again after the Christmas break. As you feed your containers, also dead head any spent flowers from bedding plants and check for health. Pests are unlikely to be a problem at this time of year, but rots and moulds maybe a problem in the damp conditions. If so, during the next dry spell, treat plants with Plant Rescue Fungus.

When you’re known for being a keen gardener and a plantaholic, the chances are you’ll end up receiving at least one living gift at Christmas. With garden centres offering them on masse at this time of year, I’ve lost count the number of moth orchids (phaelenopsis) I’ve received at Christmas, and I’ve unwrapped my fair share of bonsai trees too.

Both beautiful for very different reasons, their exotic looks give the impression that they will be difficult to keep healthy in the home. I’ll admit the first of each to grace my home didn’t last long, but a bit of research quickly led to some tips for success.

So if you end up with either a new orchid or bonsai at Christmas this year, fear not, keep both away from radiators and draughts, then use the info below to set your plants off to the best of starts.

Bonsai

• Bonsai fall under three general headings – tropical and sub-tropical (indoor year-round),  sub tropical/temperate (indoors over winter, but can go outside in spring and summer), and hardy outdoor trees that can be kept in the garden year round.
• If you don’t know which group your tree falls into, take it to a garden centre or bonsai specialist for advice. Once you know where to keep it care is simple:
• Watering: Check pots daily, when turning dry immerse the pot up to the rim in tepid water and allow to soak for 20 min (pic).
• Humidity: Mist foliage daily and stand the pot on a damp gravel tray to keep the air moit around your plant. Treat yourself to a specialist liquid bonsai feed and apply this once a week during the growing season (April-October). If you have a flowering tree, do not feed while it is blooming.
• Pruning: Do this often through the year, allowing shoots to develop 4-6 new leaves then cut them back to two.

Moth orchids:

• Moth orchids need bright light but keep out of direct sunlight during summer
• Water just once a week or less in winter (check for dry compost regularly). IN summer twice a week may be needed
• While in bloom apply a specialist orchid feed or foliar This can be reduced to every other week when not in bloom
• When flowers finish, cut the stem away, just above a  ‘bud’. After a short resting phase a new stem should develop from the top bud.

With so much to do in the build up to Christmas, gardening unfortunately falls low on the priority list, but there are two indoor Christmas plants that help me get my greenfingered fix at this time of year – poinsettia and amaryllis.

No doubt you have been tempted by them at the supermarket as you fill your trolley for the festive feast.  For as little as £4 you can have a stunning table centrepiece or windowsill display to help boost the festive feel in your home. They also make great presents for Christmas hosts

Often bought on a whim, these plants are commonly thrown out shortly after Christmas but will a little care and careful placement you can keep them in colour well into the new year. Here’s how:

Amaryllis

The prepared bulbs are just raring to get growing.

Choose a pot not much wider than the bulb and half fill with Westland Bulb Planting Compost.

Set the bulb on top of this and add more of the compost so that a third of the bulb is still above surface.

Place on a warm windowsill, keep moist and you’ll see emerging growth within days.

Give the pot a quarter turn every day or so to ensure the tall flower stem grows straight.

As the bud looks set to burst open, place the pot in a cooler room of the house. This will keep the flowers looking good for longer.  At this stage you can also apply feed such as Nutri Flower Booster to encourage the best floral display from your bulb.

If you want to save your bulb for re-use next year, remove the spent heads and allow the stem to die back naturally. Keep watered and once foliage dies back in late spring, remove the bulb from the compost and dry store in the dark for re-use next Christmas.

Poinsettia

Place poinsettia away from draughts, but also keep away from radiators and other heat sources.

Mist spray the foliage regularly to raise humidity around plants (you can also place the pot on a tray of damp gravel).

Use a drip feeder bottle to keep the plant well fed, or apply a weekly dose of Nutri All Purpose Plant Food.

Kept evenly watered and occasionally fed, your plant will survive through the year, but to get the colourful show again next Christmas exclude all artificial light from September to Christmas – covering the plant with a black plastic bag each evening if needs be.

Here’s to a colourful Christmas.

Still looking for last minute Christmas gift ideas? For friends or relatives with a taste for hot curries and other spicy dishes you can’t go wrong with the Unwin’s Gro-Sure Chilli Kit. I’ve just finished wrapping two of them for my Father-in-law and brother-in-law – I just hope they don’t read this before the big day!

In my family there is an unspoken rivalry among the men, revolving around who can eat the hottest dishes, particularly when it comes to curry night or spicing up summer BBQ food (I’m normally the winner, even if it means streaming eyes and a case of the chilli hiccups!).

I’m taking things a step further this year. While both like their spicy food, neither are particularly greenfingered, and the chilli kits are an ideal way to get them growing on the kitchen windowsill. I want to see who can grow the best chilli plant and most chillies, plus who will put the harvest to best use in the kitchen.

The packaging acts as the growing pot, and inside is a bag of compost and a packet of Gro-Sure Chilli ‘Basket of Fire’ seed (pre-treated to guarantee results). All they’ll need to do is empty the bag into the pot and sow the seed 1\4in (6mm) deep. The lid acts as a propagator until seedlings sprout. Once the seedlings are on show the lid is then placed under the pot as a drip tray. Surplus seedlings can be potted on individually – the more plants they grow on, the more chance they have of winning.

If you can’t stand the (chilli) heat, you don’t have to get out of the kitchen! Unwins offers Kitchen Garden herb growing kits and seed collections, ideal for those with a more delicate palate.

See www.unwins.co.uk for more last minute Christmas gift and stocking filler ideas.

Filling up bird feeders on a frosty morning is clear evidence of how much garden birds come to rely on our offerings in the winter months.

Having hung two Peckish feeders, one with Peckish Winter Warmer and the second with Peckish Blue Tit Mix, early on Saturday morning, I’d barely turned my back and walked away before a robin and coal tit were tucking into their breakfast!

I offer different feeds at different times of the year, based on what is visiting my garden and what they are seeking to eat. In spring and early summer the main visitors in my garden are goldfinches, and during this time, alongside a general mix such as Peckish Complete 5in1, I also offer nyger seed in specialist feeders – the goldfinches love this and it has them flocking to my garden.

These migratory birds are long gone  – probably sunning themselves on the Med over winter!  But to keep the year-round visitors happy, the niger feeders are stored away and replaced with others filled with Winter Warmer. This is made of a mix of high- energy and high-fat content seeds, vitamins and minerals to give my feathered visitors the best chance of survival through winter.

Through winter the most common visitors to my garden are tits, and in cold weather its common to see different types – blue, coal, great and long tailed – flocking together in search of food, hence why I also offer the Blue Tit Seed Mix at this time of year.

While you feed your garden birds don’t forget the birdbath. Birds actually bathe more in the colder months than they do in summer, so after making your morning cuppa take the rest of the kettle water outside to melt the ice in baths – birds need to bathe early in the morning so they have time to dry out before they roost for the night.

Amaryllis are a favourite indoor Christmas houseplant of mine. Buy a boxed, prepared bulb now, set it in some compost and once it gets going you can almost see the giant flower stem growing in front of your eyes. This rapid growth is followed by a long lasting display of giant blooms – perfect floral impact at this time of year.

Pick one up this week and you may already find it has started to shoot in the warmth of a shop shelf. As with any dormant bulb, amaryllis are packed with stored energy, so feeding is not essential, but you can give your bulbs the best of starts by using Westland bulb planting compost to pot them up.

Amaryllis don’t need huge pots to get growing, just make sure your bulb fits in your chosen pot with enough room to pack a little compost around it.

Start by half filling the pot with compost and watering this in to settle. Then place the bulb (point upwards!) and pack around the bulb with more compost, but leave up to a third of the top of the bulb poking up above the surface. Offer a little more water around the sides – avoid watering the bulb itself.

Keep on a warm windowsill and growth should take off within days. As the stem grows upwards, turn the pot regularly (daily if possible) to prevent it bending towards the light. Once buds form and are set to open, place the pot in a colder room to encourage a longer lasting floral display. You can add a drip feeder bottle at this stage to help the bulb support it’s blooms. Do not water too often, check the compost and only water when the surface is dry.

While you can go to lengths to store your bulb after flowering and wake it up again next year, it can be hit and miss- instead of flowers you may just end up with a mass of foliage for Christmas 2013. I think it better to buy a new bulb each year for guaranteed success.

Just a few pelargoniums are all that remain of my summer bedding containers after frosts hit the garden in the past week or so.

Unwins Begonia ‘Non-stop Mixed’ was still performing strongly, but at the first sign of a hard frost, flowers and foliage wilted and fell, seemingly over night.

I ordered these online as mini plug plants back in late spring, grew them on in the greenhouse, then added them to summer patio containers and they have romped away – I didn’t deadhead them at all, hardly had to water (mainly due to summer rain), and other than slow release fertiliser added at planting time, no feed was required.

And despite the frost, it’s not the end for these plants. As well as flowering strongly over summer the plants have also formed small tubers that can be dried out and stored in saw dust, ready for replanting next spring.

But with the patio now devoid of colour (except for a soon to flower Christmas camellia  – C sasanqua ‘Yuletide’, and Christmas clematis – C. cirrhosa ‘Jingle Bells’) it’s time to set out some colourful containers of winter bedding.

I like to set the colours of pansies, polyanthus, bellis and cyclamen against foliage plants such as small euonymous, ferns, grasses and heathers. The foliage plants make good centre or back plants acting as a backdrop for the seasonal flowers.

Make sure the pots you use over winter are frost proof and add a layer of gravel or broken polystyrene in the bottom so roots aren’t sitting in water after winter rain. Also raise the pots on bricks or pot feet so water sitting on the patio is not drawn back into the pot.

Mix a sprinkling of slow release fertiliser to a bucket of Westland Multi-Purpose compost with added John Innes and fill the pot and firm down. Dig out individual planting holes for each plant and set out in turn. For the best looking container, space plants close together, so little of the compost surface can be seen.

Little watering should be needed, winter rain should do the job for you, but do keep an eye on things, and if dry, offer a drink. A long period of cold may hold plants in check, but they will flower again in early spring and provide a further few months of colour until it’s time to think about sowing summer replacements.

I’m finding it harder and harder to force myself outside to the garden as temperatures continue to drop. Having looked at windowsill bean sprouts last week, I’m paying one of my houseplants some attention this week.

Dragon trees (Dracaena marginata) are a common indoor plant choice, they require little care through the year and do well in most locations around the home. There comes a point however, when these tallish plants start to look too leggy and stems become a little wayward.

These plants don’t cost the earth – supermarkets sell them at a good price, but before you decide to throw your tall plant out and replace it, think about using it to propagate your own replacements for the cost of a few pots and a pack of Westland Indoor Plant Compost. Here’s how:

Remove the top 15cm of the stem. Remove lower leaves so you have 4in (10cm) of bare stem with several leaves left at the top. Dip the base in rooting powder and insert into Westland Indoor Plant Compost (mix some sand or perlite to this to aid drainage). Firm in and water. Keep warm and watered in a bright spot, and mist foliage often until rooted.

The picture shows a cutting I took earlier this year (left), next to the cutting I have taken this week. As they grow upwards lower leaves can be removed to create the classic dragon tree appearance.

Don’t throw the remaining stem away, this can be cut into 10cm sections, and the pieces set into a large pot of the same compost. When rooted and top growth appears, pot them up individually and pass out to friends and family.

If you are a keen homegrower, the winter months can be a little disappointing in terms of regular cropping of fresh produce for the dinner table.

Through winter I make a weekly sowing of mung beans on wet kitchen towel and sprout them on the kitchen windowsill. Within five to ten days I then have a fresh and highly nutritious ingredient for my weekly stir fry.

Used at such an early stage in the plant’s development they are at their highest concentration of proteins, vitamins and minerals. Combined with my frozen ‘Chenzo’ chillies, stored onions and garlic, I only need to buy in a pepper and some mange tout or courgettes to make a cheap but tasty oriental dish.

It’s such a clean and easy process that even my two year old daughter can get involved. Simply wet two sheets of paper towel and lay these on a plate or shallow dish. Sprinkle the mung bean seeds across the surface and keep them constantly damp while on the windowsill. They are at their tastiest just as the leaves start to emerge. At this stage place them in a sieve and wash thoroughly before use.

Occasionally a patch of mould can develop around a few of the seedlings, don’t just discard these, throw out the whole batch and start again, just to be on the safe side.

Other seeds to try sprouting this way include chickpeas, aduki beans, lentils, alfalfa and sunflower seeds.

On winter days when you can’t face the cold or wet of the garden, grab yourself a packet of seed and give it a go yourself.

If you plant only one type of spring flowering bulb for early season colour in 2013, it has to be the tulip. No other spring bulb variety offers such a wide range of colours, plant height or flower shape.

Unlike daffodil and crocus displays, which get better year after year, tulips are a shorter-lived bulb, giving their best performance in the first year after planting and dwindling after the third. As such, it’s best to lift spent tulips in late spring/early summer and replace with fresh bulbs each autumn/winter.

For this reason I tend to keep my tulips contained in pots – when you empty the pot after flowers fade you can be sure all bulbs are disposed off. This can’t be said of bulbs in the ground.

Growing your tulips in containers means the pots can be keep out of site until growth appears in spring, then brought out as patio focal points or gap fillers in beds and borders before the summer performers start to appear.

Bulb specific compost provides the ideal growing conditions. Westland Bulb Compost offers a  good balance of organic matter, plant food and trace elements to meet bulb needs and includes added grit for free drainage, preventing bulbs getting too wet over winter.

To pot up, add crocks, grit or broken polystyrene to the bottom of a frost-proof container and fill with compost, leaving enough space to cover the bulbs with at least twice their depth in compost. In border soil, bulbs should be spaced a good 10cm apart but in pots this can be relaxed – just make sure they don’t touch each other.

For a really impressive display set bulbs at different levels so that the resulting spring flowers appear tiered. Winter weather should provide all the water your bulbs will need until spring.

For more tips on bulb containers see http://www.gardenhealth.com/blog/plant-care-and-propagation/projects/how-to-plant-bulbs-in-containers/