Winter not over yet

Today is one of those mornings that we used to describe as a "Hangman's Monday", dark, wet, dreary and quite frankly horrible. But hey, I am still alive and that is really what matters. Fortunately, I do not suffer from sad syndrome but when it gets depressing, like today, I tend to put a nice bright picture on the computer screen- saver. of a garden I particularly liked or felt at ease with. And so today, I am posting a lovely pic of William Morris's garden at his home in Oxfordshire - Kelmscott.

Kelmscott is one of those places where you are perfectly at peace, no noise, just the sound of the rooks (who do make quite a racket actually but a nice one). The picture is of an old barn in the meadow just behind the house and I think it just sums up England in the height of summer.

Back in the power house - the Reckless team are planning the garden visits for this year and hopefully we will be able to introduce you to several more of our outstanding gardens.

Christopher Lloyd in his book 'Christopher Lloyd's gardening year' makes the point that February will be influenced by the weather pattern established in January, in temperature and mood. So it will either be a winter month, prolonging the agony he says, or the beginning of Spring. Well, on today's basis I suspect that we will be prolonging the agony a bit longer. Lloyd liked February, for him the month heralded a time when things were on the move in his garden. He also, not without a touch of irony, comments that if the month is a mild one the pessimists will declare that we will pay for it later on, but wisely he points out that there is nothing we can do about it, no matter what happens, and that somehow puts it all into perspective, as only Christo could do.

Gardeners tend to fuss so much about the weather, it is too wet or too dry, too much wind, frost, not enough light and a thousand and one other things. I have to admit I have had sleepless nights worrying over this plant or that, or whether there was going to be a gale or bad frost. In the end the garden knows how to take care of itself, and we have to accept as gardeners, that there will always be some loss - in our case more generally to the dreaded slug than to any weather pattern.

So as we enter February we return to Christopher Lloyd who loved to collect snowdrops this month and place a fistful of stems next to him indoors to that he could inhale their honey scent. So there, what more could you want! Enjoy the simple pleasures of life and savour the magic that February can bring.

Spring is in the air

Once Christmas passed by, the Reckless website started to come to life again and the emails into the editor and myself began increasing daily. So in the same vein I hope that shortly the firm first signs of Spring will start to come forward. I know it is a few months away yet and we have had a cold winter,but it is always exciting when you reach the end of January and feel the coming gardening season getting nearer.

Already there are some clematis in bud, not always good because a nasty frost can come along and demolish them, but if you find yourself in this situation and are worried about that then you can always protect with some fleece for a couple of weeks.

The snowdrops are coming up and I can see the first signs of daffodils althought he Camellia trees, which flowered on the third week of January last year, have yet to show promise of blooms opening.

You may have noticed that we have done a re-design on the website, which has occupied some of the winter months, and we hope you like what we have done. We are planning to increase the interaction sections on the website and for the forthcoming season, more podcasts and video clips too.

I was not surprised to see that the snail and slug is still top of the RHS pest list. I would not like to be a party to genocide but I always declare war on those little horrors. At the moment they seem to be attacking the wallflowers - and the damp conditions of the summer and autumn will only have aided them in their crusade to denude our gardens of greenery and fresh shoots.

You are supposed to gather them on Valentines day and dispose of them before they start breeding, so its on with the tin helmet in a couple of weeks and armed with a big bag we will go forth and conquer. I hope!

We have put a new section on the website for readers pictures, so if you have a garden you are proud of why not send us a jpg and we will put it up.

By the end of January show news will start to come through so do be sure to check out the website regularly.