Sally Briggs, Head Gardener at Merriments Gardens in Hurst Green talked me through some of her thoughts and plans for changes to their garden earlier this week and inspired me to go out and do the same. She walks round the garden, as we did together, looking at plantings that she feels don’t quite work. For example, looking across one of the ponds at a dry bank of horizontal conifers andCotoneaster horizontalis as well as a tangle of ivy under and around Sorbus hupehensis is, she feels, a little uninspiring. So out with the cotoneaster, the ivy and the conifer. She is proposing to introduce cistus with their fragrant evergreen leaves with perhaps a companion planting of Sedum ‘Dark Jack’ and Geranium ‘Rozanne’. And in the formal garden she feels that the combination of white buddleias next to grey-leaved weeping pears doesn’t provide the impact that she wants so the buddleias will be coming out. And thinking about focal points is important. A curved white metal bench built round an oak this year has completely changed the look of what was and is a dark area but now the eye is drawn to it and to its complementary planting of plants like the lovely white valerian. And where, on reflection, dahlias have been too tall for the bed or not quite the right colour, these will be taken out at the end of the season and replanted elsewhere next year. D. Café au Lait (too wishy-washy?) will be replaced by the combination of D. ‘Grenadier’ and D. ‘Peach Brandy’.

The blue gravel area is a little barren until the Verbena bonariensis get going later in the season so bearded irises in blue and white and the velvety purple I. ‘Sable’ will be introduced to provide early vertical interest. Sally mentioned thinking about the aspect before you plant. I had a ‘How could you?’ moment when she said that she had taken out a mature Cornus controversa, but it had been planted in an area of the garden where it was constantly being damaged by the wind whipping round it. And so there’s now a gap for something new. I was reading about Cotinus obovatus this week and imagining it there but it is not my garden!

Discussing a friend’s first year with her tiny but floriferous garden, she has realised that hollyhocks are fine until they develop rust and in a small garden it is particularly noticeable, so they will be coming out. And also that three clumps of Nepeta ‘Six Hills Giant’ which she inherited are wonderful but overwhelming in a particularly small area. And another friend with a particularly beautiful Mediterranean garden set amongst mature olive trees just outside Grasse has had fun with her new vegetable patch this year. She is planning winter crops now and slower growing crops for the spring. Salads, Asian greens and broad beans are going in, and to quote: ‘the French down in the South grow and harvest these very early to be one step ahead of blackfly’. *

I think we need to think about mulching and what we are going to use to improve our soil for next year. I’ve been to two large local gardens this year where both owners employed gardeners and neither garden had any form of compost heap. Whatever the size of the garden, if at all possible have a composting area or wormery or a patch of comfrey that you can use to make a comfrey compost, and add as much organic matter this winter whether it be spent mushroom compost, well rotted farmyard manure or your own compost. Growing sweet peas or runner beans next year? Dig a trench and add a dollop of well rotted manure well in advance and they will romp away next season.

Think about colour combinations and don’t be afraid to move plants when you see that they don’t quite work with their neighbours or aren’t flourishing where they are. Too dry perhaps, too shady, too sunny? They may well surprise you next season as their desire to survive is huge. I saw on Gardeners’ World that Monty Don was moving Helianthus ‘Lemon Queen’ now as its colour didn’t work in his Jewel Garden. You lose the flowers for this season by chopping back all top growth before moving, but who cares. It will be just as happy next year. Flood the hole you’ve dug for it before replanting and firm it in and it will be fine. I’ve noticed that competition between a native hedge and some shrubs – for instance Elaeagnus ‘Quicksilver’ and Rubus odoratus, the thimbleberry, have reduced the shrubs to a leafless mess this year so the plan is to move them away from the hedge and mulch, mulch and more mulch. Or leave them where they are and mulch, mulch, mulch. Actually, the rubus is wasted in that you have to clamber into the border to catch its fragrance. So once again, think about where you are planting things. If plants are fragrant, grow them where you can get at them. There’s a Daphne bholua‘Jacqueline Postill’ at the entrance to the winter garden at the Cambridge Botanic Garden which I used to wonder about as its form is not particularly attractive in that it is very upright and stiff in my view, but that is worth putting up with when you get closer to the plant and realise that it has a sensational scent which becomes more intense when warmed by the winter sun. And thinking about the winter months, plant crocuses for both your pleasure early in the season and to provide nectar for foraging insects when there is not a lot available after the winter. C. tommasianus flower early and open out fully in the winter sun and come in a range of colours from the pale silvery lilac through to the dark purple form C. t. ‘Ruby Giant’. These aren’t expensive to buy so although they do self-seed and will eventually provide a carpet of colour, it’s worth investing in larger quantities than you intended to get the effect. Make sure that where you plant them has a fairly short final mow before the winter so that you can see your crocus to full effect when they come up. I know that mice rather like to munch on the bulbs but where was it I read that grated carbolic soap deters them?