February and March bloom with Flower and Garden Shows to give enthusiasts ideas for the approaching planting season. The Connecticut Flower and Garden Show, themed “Traditions of Nature” and offering more than 300 booths, landscaped gardens, seminars, and demonstrations, runs from Feb. 23 to 26 at the Hartford Convention Center.

Philadelphia’s International Flower Show opens at the Pennsylvania Convention Center on March 4 and continues through March 8, with a Hawaiian theme showcasing orchids, towering waterfalls, and designer gardens that highlight the flowers, plants, stories, art, and culture of Hawaii’s big six islands.  “First Impressions” is the jumping off point of the Boston Flower and Garden Show, running from March 14 through March 18 at the Seaport World Trade Center, with the intention of showing visitors how to put a “Wow” factor into their landscaping.

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PHUKET: When I was young, papayas (pronounced papaiya) were considered very exotic, rarities that occasionally came along with other fresh fruit – mangoes and kiwi fruit, at the end of an expensive dinner.

Here papayas (stress on the last syllable please) are the most available of fruit. In Isarn, a meal without green shredded papayas in the mix is almost unthinkable. It’s a basis for soups, salads, stews and much else besides. Som tam is a classic papaya concoction. Here, in the south, the huge fruits are more often allowed to ripen and are served as a dessert, though they are also used in savory dishes. The distinctive flavor is not to everyone’s taste – sweet and slightly perfumed. If you like melons, you will probably like papayas.

Either way, the plant, known elsewhere in the world as the paw-paw, is probably the easiest of all fruit trees to cultivate in Thailand – and one of the most civilized. Civilized because it grows vigorously and quickly from seed, has a neat appearance, and crops heavily. In fact, it produces those huge succulent, marrow-shaped offerings in less than a year. Having borne a crop continuously for several months, a haul which may consist of as many as twenty or more weighing up to two kilos, its top leaves begin to turn yellow. That is usually a sign that the plant is on the way out. It can then be unceremoniously hacked down – since the stem is fleshy and hollow – with a single blow from a sharp machete. The root will soon rot away.

Papayas are technically not trees at all, but they give every appearance of being so. They are attractive plants, single-stemmed and with a crown of soft, palmately lobed leaves. Normally there are no branches and the fruit hang down from the trunk just below the crown.

Unique? Yes. There is only one species (carica papaya), which originated from Mexico, though inevitably there have been a number of commercial cultivars such as Maradol, Sunrise and Caribbean Red. These are normally ready to eat when the skin is turning red or orange and still has patches of green. Pick it as soon as it is ripe: the fruit rapidly goes soft and begins to rot once it has passed its sell-by date. In some tropical cultures, the papaya, which contains an enzyme called papain has other medicinal uses – bizarrely as a contraceptive, and for tenderizing meat. The black seeds can also be eaten: crushed, they serve as a substitute for pepper.

Peculiarly suited to this island’s climate, the papaya is beginning to become naturalized on vacant lots around Phuket. If you do intend to grow it, plant a number of the peppery seeds from a ripe fruit directly into the soil, then water and await results. Many will germinate after a couple of weeks. Since the males do not bear fruit, remove them once they have produced their slender stalks with small white blooms. You may decide to keep one male, but usually papayas are self-pollinating, or are cross pollinated by insects or wind.

The plants can take oodles of sun, and will also need plenty of water and nutrients. After all they are going to produce lots of goodies. Moreover, they are relatively disease free – at least in Phuket. Hawaii had its entire crop decimated by the ring-spot virus, but here nothing worse than the odd fruit-fly seems to impede their upward progress.

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Type "gardener" into the Google in your head and you'll probably get something a little like this; gentle, patient, fond of pottering, sartorially biased towards corduroy.

Yes, yes, not all gardeners are like that, but that's undeniably the stereotype. Anyway, this post is not about that type of gardener. It's not about tending our own private utopias behind a safe boundary of leylandii. It's about something altogether more dangerous and sexier than that. It's about rebel gardeners: those people who use their botanical skills to make political, economic and social statements rather than say something about new directions in decking.

They are the kind of activists who carry farming equipment not to symbolise the proletariat, but because they've got some serious hoeing to do. They're not mild-mannered; they're angry. And while they may be patient when it comes to buds flowering, when it comes to urban wastelands, unsustainable town planning, the food industry, unemployment, social exclusion and the relentless grey, grey, grey of our towns and cities they are extraordinarily feisty.

Over the coming seasons, we'll visit various rebel gardening projects. Every month we'll talk to the people involved and, should you choose to take up the thorn-proof pruning gauntlet, we'll find out how you can muck in and get involved, or even start a similar project in your area.

We'll visit radical socialist gardeners like those in Incredible Edible Todmorden. This Yorkshire town is planting every available surface with veggies. They are on a mission to reject the global food industry and become the UK's first food self-sustaining town. We'll drop in on The Plant in Chicago where rebels are transforming a disused industrial building into a zero emission farm.

As our high streets wither in the shadow of recession, radical gardeners are reimagining our shared social spaces as green ones. We'll meet the people following in the muddy bootprints of Ebenezer Howard, creator of the original garden city, Letchworth: like the team behind Cardiff's vertical gardening project, How Green Is Your Alley? Or Elephant and Castle's original guerilla gardening Richard Reynolds, currently busy with his Mobile Gardeners project.

We'll meet Wayward Plants, masters of temporary conceptual gardens. In the past they've brought us the Urban Physic Garden in Southwark, the Union Street Orchard also in South London and Algaegarden, a garden planted with pond grasses and hung with plastic tubes filled with different coloured algae that appeared at the 2011 Metis International Garden Festival in Quebec.

Elsewhere we'll visit gardeners expressing ideas about equality and opportunities for disadvantaged groups. We'll look at organizations like The Comfrey Project which works with refuges and asylum seekers on allotment sites across Newcastle and Gateshead. Or the Redhall Walled Garden where people with mental health issues are introduced to the therapeutic benefits of green fingers.

We'll speak to the people answering the question "how do you eat local when you live in a tower block?" These are people like Something & Son who have transformed a Hackney shop into a farm with their Farm:Shop. And Food From The Sky, the edible garden above a Crouch End supermarket. A flight of stairs! How's that for reduced food miles?

Depending on how historical we're feeling we may look at the roots of radical gardening too. The Green Guerillas of 1970s New York, the original community gardeners and throwers of seed-bombs. And the UK's own Meanwhile Gardens near Westbourne Park, where the wasteland turned adventure garden boasted the UK's first skateboard pit.

For now I shall leave you with this: the word "radical", whether you take it to mean reformist in the political sense, or unconventional in the cultural sense or just plain awesome in the 1970s teenage sense, derives from the Latin word "radix", meaning "root". Radish is also derived from radix. So gardening and revolution, not such unlikely allotment-mates after all.

Do you know a gardener, greener, community gardener or adopter of feral lands who's digging for a better society? Perhaps there's someone in your life who's on a mission to change the world one vegetable patch at a time? Let us know below about the projects you find inspiring and perhaps we'll feature them here.

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THE founders of a garden fair set in the award-winning grounds of a Northamptonshire stately home are hoping to double the number of visitors this year.

Cottesbrooke Gardeners’ Fair, as it will now be known, began at Cottesbrooke Hall near Brixworth four years ago, but this year Alastair Macdonald-Buchanan and Therese Lang have launched a new three-year plan to turn the growing event into a nationwide spectacle.

The pair are seeking support from hotels, restaurants and attractions across Northamptonshire to draw in visitors and help other businesses across the county benefit from the three-day fair. Last year the plant fair attracted 7,602 people, more than three times the number in its opening year.

Mr Macdonald-Buchanan, who lives at the 18th-century house, said: “The fair is a huge, very exciting event, but we need to give it a kick and push it a bit harder, and it will be something that all of Northamptonshire can benefit from. The numbers have been increasing over the last four years and more people from outside the county are attending.

“We have been working tirelessly since the event last year addressing every area of our business. We have some of the best plant growers in the county and we want to get that message out there to garden experts, growers and lovers. We want to make this fair a key event in any gardener’s diary. It’s an exciting show that we want to take to the next level. We believe we now run a national event which is unique compared to other garden fairs. We want to bring people in from outside the county and encourage them to stay more than a day, that can only be a good for Northamptonshire and its profile.”

The fair already has links with nearby restaurant The Red Lion in East Haddon, and support from Moulton College, whose staff and students will hold demonstrations at the fair.

Since the fair in June, the team has been working on improving catering facilities, car parking and toilets as well as boosting the fair with more diverse exhibitors and an ‘inspire’ area where garden designers will give advice on how to create your own garden.

A new website, to be re-launched in March, will offer a range of ticket options and a loyalty scheme is also being developed. The event will be held over the three days between Friday June, 22 and Sunday June 24.

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It usually takes a period of enforced inactivity – illness or bad weather perhaps – for gardeners to stop and contemplate their gardens, but the new year is just the right time to view progress, pat ourselves on the back or admit defeat. It's almost exactly a year to the day that I moved here from Suffolk, so I have extra encouragement to take stock, and I'm looking out from exactly the same viewpoint (my bedroom window) where I first studied this garden. There have obviously been changes, but because we gardeners always look forward and not back, brushing aside past efforts – however superhuman – we concentrate on the future. It's what keeps us all going.

My plan was to divide the space (150ft x 50ft) into three: the part nearest the house to be dedicated to the good things in life – entertaining and small vegetable beds, herbs and plants in pots; the central plot turned into an orchard and wild-flower meadow with a chicken run; and the end bit left to wildlife and future grandchildren.

All have come to fruition (including one grandchild) and although nothing is quite up to scratch – this is no instant makeover – the framework is there.

Uppermost in my design was the determination not to lumber myself with too much work in the future. I admit it's heartbreaking not to contemplate beds of favourite perennials, to limit myself to a lawn that I can cut with a small cylinder mower, not to indulge my plant fantasies or show off. But I hope to keep myself in produce, kindling and eggs and to satisfy my need to grow those small seasonal special things that make life worth living: the first pot of bulbs, elderflower cordial, a home-laid egg or two, bowls of salad leaves, the perfect posy, fruit pickings and jars of preserves for the larder. I want my grandson to take his first steps on my tiny lawn, to be able to have family lunches on the terrace, for my sons to be able to indulge in hobbies in sheds and for wildlife to flourish (no foxes and magpies, please). A low-maintenance garden that doesn't mean I've given up.

Looking out through my French windows, I can see our first success: the scaffolding-board-decked terrace made by my son Jacques that joins the house to the garden without bringing the garden into the house. I love just sitting on the warm wood in the summer, but the wet wood in winter needs care. To the left is the workshop my younger son Max has built to house his precious beach buggy and keep his sanity, neatly painted to co-ordinate with the rest of the garden. The small lawn for picnics surrounded by brick paths leads on to a herb and vegetable garden to the left and a seating area to the right, both artfully made by carpenter Martin Pammant and divided from the rest of the garden and the hens by a bay hedge, cordoned apples and a gateway leading to a mown path into the orchard, where thousands of bulbs are poised waiting.

Like most of the east coast, I can blame the historic lack of rain for failures among the fruit trees, causing casualties like the medlar, a cherry and six cobnuts that just never broke into leaf. Despite having poured compost and grit into large holes with a snug covering of weed-suppressant matting and pebbles, it has been a difficult year for major planting, not helped by this garden's main drawback, the heavy clay soil.
A lifetime of conditioning won't be enough. And I still have fence panels aplenty to clothe, some with climbers, some with painted wooden panelling, a few trompe l'oeil gates to suggest life beyond, and a barrier at the bottom of the orchard. Maybe a "fedge", a combination of hedge and fence made of poles containing branches too solid to compost and too weedy to burn. I need to diminish my bramble content and some of the shrubbery under the oak tree that dominates the space.

My small front garden has been fenced using painted pickets of spaced roofing battens that offer a tiny sunny haven from the busy road that sweeps past the front of the house. We'll make a decorative paved apron around the front porch to house welcoming pot plants, flanked by a couple of small carpet beds of succulents. Nice to have plans and schemes to come.

I love my new garden. More peaceful than I expected, it's not really a seaside garden. I can still grow a wide range of plants, despite the sea being just beyond the allotments and golf course, but it has a slightly holiday feel. This is an atmosphere which I hope to elaborate with style, but without creating a millstone for the future.

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Green-fingered teenager Jamie Butterworth is set to take the gardening world by storm. And he hopes to make his mark in front of millions after reaching the final of a prestigious TV competition. The 17-year-old from Durkar, Wakefield, has won a place in the final four of the gardening category of the BBC’s popular Young Talent of the Year show.

Jamie, who studies horticulture at Askham Bryan College in Harrogate, will feature on the show set to be screened on BBC Three at the end of this month. He wowed judges with his enthusiasm for horticulture and impressed them with his knowledge of the whole subject. He said: “I guess it’s quite unusual for someone my age to be that into gardening, it’s not the typical hobby but it’s something I love to do and I think the judges liked that.

“I love being able to sow something and a few months later be able to harvest it – it’s so rewarding and something I encourage anyone to do. “Being on the show was the best experience of my life by far. It was surreal but absolutely fantastic. I’m only just coming down off the high of getting to the top four.”

Jamie’s interest in gardening grew after he watched an episode of BBC TV show Gardeners’ World when he was just 10-years-old. The programme inspired him to go out in the garden and experiment with junior gardening, and shortly he was bitten by the planting bug.

Jamie, who works part time at First Impressions Nursery, Doncaster Road, Ackworth, said: “A lot of people get the impression people my age just stand around on street corners and get up to no good, but this is a good way of showing that’s not always the case.

“That’s what the programme is trying to promote and I’m behind that completely, getting young people into gardening is something I feel very strongly about.”

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The start of the spring semester may not be ideal for planting, but it is ideal for planning what to plant.
This year's Nebraska Master Gardener training is just around the corner. "Anyone can be a ‘Master Gardener,' they just have to have interest in gardening and helping people," said Mary Jane Frogge, UNL extension associate for the Lancaster County office. The Master Gardener program at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln is a volunteer-based program in which participants "provide education about sustainable horticulture practices," according to the UNL Master Gardener website.

People become Master Gardeners to give back to the community — and it looks great on a résumé, said Terri James, UNL Extension Horticulture assistant. "It's a great program, a great way to give back to your community," she said. The training begins in February, and the deadline for registration is Jan. 27. There is also a materials fee of $150. Master Gardening training classes are in the winter, she said, and the volunteer opportunities are in the summer.

The volunteer activity required at the Lancaster County program is for Master Gardeners to answer phone calls from the public about horticulture for 12 out of the 40 volunteer hours. Master Gardeners can complete the rest of the hours volunteering at a variety of places, such as the county and state fairs, school gardens and Community CROPS, a non-profit organization in Lincoln. The class will be offered at two locations — at the Lancaster County Extension Office and another on the University of Nebraska-Lincoln's East Campus.

The training is dictated by state rules, said James, who is in charge of the East Campus training. It will cover topics like different soil types and plant problems ranging from diseases to knowing the difference between good and bad insects and how all of this can be managed by a gardener. Participants take 40 training hours and complete 40 volunteer hours in one year. James said the time commitment is a deterrent for college students."There is definitely a gap in the knowledge of growing food, but I don't know if I would focus on age," said Ingrid Kirst, executive director of Community CROPS.

She said she's noticed younger people asking about Community CROPS' community garden plots lately.
The training doesn't necessarily make someone an expert, Kirst said. But it does start an ongoing learning experience, she said. To keep the title, Master Gardeners are required to complete a minimum of 10 hours of continued education and 20 hours of volunteer work — set by counties.

Continued education, volunteer work and making connections with other gardeners are benefits to the involvement. And Master Gardening is "getting you outside, growing your own food," Kirst said. James said the training programs fill up fast. Last week there was only one slot open in the East Campus program. After that, the wait-list for next year starts. The Lancaster County program takes applications until Jan. 27. The application is then reviewed and interviews are set up to see who gets into the program.

Lincoln offers other opportunities for gardeners, too. There's a "seed swap" coming up at Meadowlark Coffee & Espresso on Jan. 29 that will include some educational components. Frogge said the inability to commit the time to Master Gardener training shouldn't prevent anyone from pursuing their passions. "Keep it in the back of your mind for something to do in the future and always look at different opportunities for gardening," she said.

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1 Alan Titchmarsh
Alan Titchmarsh is indisputably still the friendly “face of British gardening”, despite recent forays into chat shows and other subject areas. Ask anyone in Britain to name a gardener and the great Titchmarsh (widely mispronounced “Titmarsh”) will usually be invoked. Such a profile gives the broadcaster unparalleled influence in this sector – which is, of course, why B&Q hired him as their public face in 2010.

2 Sue Biggs
The Royal Horticultural Society is still in some turmoil. Although it has the highest number of members in its history, it continues to grapple with an identity crisis (is it a charity or a business?). Sue Biggs, the latest director-general, took up her position in August 2010 following the sudden departure of the previous incumbent. Biggs’s friendly manner has gone down well, but concerns remain about over-commercialisation within the charity and the direction it may take following the recent £18 million sale of its Lawrence Hall in London.

3&4 Martyn Phillips and Terry Duddy
The chief execs of B&Q (Martyn Phillips) and Homebase (Terry Duddy) take third and fourth place in the list, since their businesses vie with each other: both currently have about 330 UK outlets. Garden centres may remain more popular with gardeners, but in overall turnover and market share the two DIY superstores outstrip them by a considerable margin. The decisions of their buyers can have a marked impact on the nation’s gardens. B&Q is the bigger player, with 14.8 per cent of overall market share, but Homebase may have made a better strategic choice by using Jamie Oliver as its public face, since it is the under-40s who tend to use DIY superstores for garden purchases as opposed to garden centres.

5 Monty Don
Back for a second stint as main presenter of the BBC’s Gardeners’ World, the “posh”, smouldering, leather-jerkinned Monty Don bucks the historic trend towards a more gumboot-and-braces approach to television gardening. More than simply the “housewives’ choice”, Don has gained a wide fan base, extending his reach with several globe-trotting series about gardens around the world plus, of course, a string of bestselling tie-in books.

6 Mark Fane
The online nursery Crocus has become the supplier of choice for most of the leading designers at Chelsea and other high-profile shows, and is therefore acknowledged within the industry as the horticultural powerhouse behind a high proportion of gold-medal-winning gardens. Co-director Mark Fane – already widely respected – has consolidated his influence recently by taking up voluntary positions at both the RHS (as a council member) and the Garden Museum (as chairman).

7 Alison Kirkham
Television remains the single most powerful force in the world of gardens in the UK. As commissioning editor for “factual features and formats” at the BBC, responsibility lies with Kirkham when it comes to deciding who, as the presenters of Gardeners’ World, will be the faces of British gardening, and the strategic direction of the flagship show. Recent controversial decisions made by the BBC include the unceremonious “retirement” of lead presenter Toby Buckland in 2010 and the simultaneous loss of rising star and “face of the allotment generation” Alys Fowler.

8 Simon Jenkins
Chairman of the National Trust since 2008, Jenkins has overseen - in tandem with director-general Fiona Reynolds - a root-and-branch overhaul of the organisation. The decision to scrap the well-established system of gardens advisers, who hitherto had great power over decisions made in NT gardens, and to replace them with consultants whose advice is non-obligatory, is bound to have an impact. Jenkins, with Reynolds, has also been busy remoulding the NT as a campaigning body in the light of mooted changes to the planning system, using his extensive influence in the media as an ex-editor of The Times.

9 Christopher Woodward
The director of the Garden Museum took up his post in 2006 and quickly turned around an institution which was considered to be ailing and in need of inspiration. Woodward has instituted a culture of curated exhibitions and, even more importantly, a rolling programme of events (talks, discussions, study days) which have made the museum into a true hub of the gardens world. Woodward is also a trustee of the Heritage Lottery Fund, which distributes money to public parks and landscape projects.

10 Christine Walkden
“Down-to-earth” and “no-nonsense” gardening advice remains at a premium in print and on television, and Christine Walkden is currently the prime purveyor of this sought-after information. She boasts a strong and loyal following thanks to two series about her own garden and now as resident gardening expert on the BBC’s The One Show. Walkden’s style is in the tradition of Geoff Hamilton and Percy Thrower: we tend to trust what she says.

11 HRH Prince of Wales
Ridiculed in the 1980s for his early adoption of organic principles, it is now clear that the Prince of Wales was simply way ahead of the game. The Prince has recently consolidated his interest in sustainability via community gardening with the Start initiative, launched in 2010 (startuk.org). At his own garden at Highgrove, the Prince has employed leading designers including Rosemary Verey and Sir Roy Strong to create a garden, though it is in a process of continuous renewal.

12 Piet Oudolf
The influential Dutch plantsman, leading light in the “New Perennials” movement of naturalistic planting design, Piet Oudolf has been largely responsible for the vogue for grasses and for the trend for form rather than colour. Britain has long been a home-from-home for him, as well as the launchpad for his rise to stardom in the United States, thanks to his work at the High Line in New York and Chicago’s Millennium Park. In this country his major projects can be seen at Scampston Hall and at Trentham (where he collaborated with both Tom Stuart-Smith and Dominic Cole, listed below). Oudolf has just won the commission for the Olympic Park legacy planting.

13 Dominic Cole
Not a household name among gardeners, Dominc Cole is more of a behind-the-scenes operator, quietly exerting influence during the past decade as chair of both the National Trust’s gardens advisory panel and of the Garden History Society (GHS). Cole is credited as the saviour of the GHS after it got into financial difficulties and has campaigned for higher pay for garden staff within the National Trust. Formidably well-connected, Cole’s “day job” is as one of the most experienced historic gardens consultants in Britain.

14 Penelope Hobhouse
The current reigning “grande dame” of the British gardening scene, with a formidable reputation, Hobhouse is talked of in near-reverential terms by many Shires gardeners, not to mention her legions of fans across the Atlantic. Author of numerous acclaimed books on garden design and history, if “Penny” is moved to speak out, then the gardening world will always sit up straight and listen attentively.

15 Carol Klein
Currently the female face of British gardening courtesy of her second-in-command role on the BBC’s Gardeners’ World, many had hoped the passionate and creative Northerner would be given the top job in the most recent changeover. Fans were instead appeased last year with Klein’s own well received cottage-garden series. Never one to shy away from a fight, it may be that Klein will become more outspoken as her career develops.

16 Juliet Roberts
Gardens Illustrated remains Britain’s most influential garden publication in terms of the formation of taste in planting and design (a mantle formerly held by Country Life). Over the past seven years, editor Juliet Roberts has steered the magazine through turbulent periods including several changes in ownership (as of last year, the magazine is no longer part of the BBC) and also relocation from London to Bristol. Despite this, circulation has risen and the magazine has not “dumbed down” by decreasing coverage of, for example, foreign gardens.

17 Robin Lane-Fox
The Financial Times’s garden columnist is also a fellow in ancient history at New College, Oxford. Lane-Fox crossed swords in print with the late, great Christopher Lloyd on several occasions, and is now widely considered his successor by a loyal following. Lane-Fox writes with candour on topics such as mole extermination and is not afraid to display his considerable intellectual “hinterland”.

18 John Watkins
The head of gardens at English Heritage controls few important gardens, when compared with the National Trust, but as an organisation EH has been more dynamic in recent years, with major – if controversial – restorations at Kenilworth Castle and Chiswick House. EH also controls the listing process, whereby gardens of historic significance are listed Grade I, II* or II, a description which in theory offers some protection in the face of unsympathetic planning applications. Watkins also co-authored the standard work on the management of historic gardens.

19 Sir Roy Strong
The most prominent garden historian in Britain, the ex-V & A Museum director is respected for his wide-ranging knowledge of the arts; in this regard, he has done much to augment the credibility of garden history as an academic discipline. Twice president of the Garden History Society, Sir Roy’s books on Renaissance gardens remain standard works, while his own exuberantly decorated garden, The Laskett, engenders violent divisions of opinion (surely a good thing).

20 DG Hessayon
Ever-present on the gardening bestseller list, the publicity-shy (but not actually shy) Dr David Gerald Hessayon has been going strong with the reassuringly old-fashioned “Expert” series since 1958. With tens of millions of copies in the series sold, at least one slim volume by this author is likely to be present on the shelves of nearly all of Britain's gardeners, offering impeccable and uncontroversial advice.

21 Mark Diacono
The fastest-rising star in the gardens world in 2011, Diacono first came to prominence as the horticultural maestro behind Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall’s River Cottage operation. With a string of acclaimed fruit and veg books (for which he also took the photographs) and a growing television presence, the genial Diacono’s star is surely set to ascend farther in 2012.

22 Tom Stuart-Smith
The most influential, taste-forming garden designer in Britain today. Stuart-Smith’s planting style seeks to intensify or distil the elements of nature itself – and he has won Best in Show for his gardens at Chelsea more times than any other contemporary designer. Eminently acceptable company at any dinner table, he was also chosen by the Queen to design a new garden at Windsor Castle.

23 Jamie Oliver
Like several other television chefs, Jamie Oliver has recently started to diversify into gardening, a fact not unrelated to his new role as the face of Homebase. As he says: “One of the most beautiful things in life is to plant something, grow it and pick it.” While it’s not clear precisely how much gardening this globetrotter does himself, there is now a substantial horticultural section on his website. Stand by for brand Jamie to expand further in 2012.

24 Richard Reynolds
The original “guerrilla gardener”, based in a tower block in London’s benighted Elephant and Castle, Richard Reynolds has built up a substantial international following over the past decade. His night-time escapades, “illegally” gardening derelict and unloved segments of cities around the world (he recently hit Warsaw), has proved an inspiration to a new generation of gardeners.

25 Roy Lancaster
Truly a horticultural national treasure, Lancaster is loved and admired by thousands of gardeners for the depth and breadth of his knowledge of plants, borne of many foreign expeditions and a lifetime in horticulture, all beguilingly wrapped up with his authentic geniality. Lancaster has been outspoken in his advocacy of shrubs in recent decades, and his is a voice which will always be attended to with respect and affection.

26 George Plumptre
The garden writer (formerly of The Times) is now chief executive of the National Gardens Scheme, the charity best known for its “Yellow Book”. This annual directory lists 3,700 (mainly private) gardens selected as good enough to open to the public, raising some £2.5 million each year. Plumptre is thus the “voice” of thousands of the country’s best gardeners in 2012, the NGS’s 85th anniversary year.

27 Crüg Farm Plants – Bleddyn and Sue Wynn-Jones
Proprietors of the most influential nursery in the United Kingdom, the Wynn-Joneses are celebrated for their practice of travelling the world (most recently Korea and Japan) in search of new plants to bring home, raise and then offer for sale. Stocks are of course limited, which only adds to the allure. They describe their nursery as a “mecca” for plants enthusiasts – and for once the epithet is justified.

28 Anne Wareham
The Bad Tempered Gardener (the title of her 2011 book) is the scourge of all that is dull and mediocre in gardening and garden design. Also the prime mover behind thinkingardens.co.uk, Wareham caused a storm last year with an attack on Sir Roy Strong’s garden, The Laskett. Wareham leads by example with her experimental garden in Wales, The Veddw.

29 The 'Sheffield School’ – James Hitchmough and Nigel Dunnett
Not on the radar yet for most gardeners, this pair of university academics is set to soar up the influence list in 2012 courtesy of the naturalistic plantings they have designed for the Olympic Park in east London. The Sheffield School’s signature plantings of massed perennial and annual plants are a world away from the standard municipal or corporate style usually seen at this scale, and may well come to exert an influence on public parks nationally.

30 Tim Richardson
He’d never include himself, but our author exerts considerable influence of his own: columnist; critic; author of 10 books; director of Chelsea Fringe – the event of 2012; trustee of the Garden History Society; member of the National Trust Gardens panel; and creator of a new garden history course at the University of Oxford.

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The season for New Year's Resolutions is upon us. As I reflect on what resolutions I might want to make, I am torn between making the easy resolutions I know I can keep and the more difficult ones that are going to require more work and commitment on my part. Although we are past the holiday giving season, make a resolution of garden giving. Garden giving can take many forms and help many people, but the best involve sharing.

One organization I am involved with is the Garden Writers Association. As a part of its public service, it launched the Plant a Row (PAR) program in 1995 for the Garden Writers Association (GWA) and the GWA Foundation, and I am indebted to the organization for the following information.

There are more than 84 million households with a yard or garden in the U.S. If every gardener plants one extra row of vegetables and donates their surplus to local food agencies and soup kitchens, it will make a significant impact on reducing hunger.

According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, 1 in 8 households in the U.S. experiences hunger or the risk of hunger. Many frequently skip meals or eat too little, sometimes going without food for an entire day.

Some 33 million people, including 13 million children, have substandard diets or must seek emergency food assistance. The demand for hunger assistance has increased 70 percent in recent years, and many are turned away from food banks because of lack of resources.

As a part of its work, the PAR program assists in coordinating local food collection systems and monitors the volume of donations being conveyed to food agencies. Since 1995, more than 16 million pounds of produce providing more than 60 million meals have been donated by American gardeners. All this is done without government subsidy or bureaucratic red tape — just people helping people.

Many local organizations also provide food resources for the hungry. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints has an extensive welfare program to produce food to assist the needy. Local units provide ground, resources and training for community and individual gardeners.

Many other religious denominations also sponsor community gardening projects. If you are an experienced gardener, don't wait to be asked to help. Teach some classes, help beginning gardeners learn how and share extra produce from your own garden.

The Utah State University Master Gardener program is an excellent way to learn more about gardening. In some counties, USU master gardeners also sponsor or assist with community gardening projects.

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Vegetable gardening is actually practiced by a few for money by most for the type of satisfaction it provides. Doing a bit of vegetable gardening, having your own vegetable backyard up and then while using fresh vegetables directly from your personal garden for your dinner, is a pleased experience that can be recognized and felt only if you do it on your own. Vegetable gardening is extremely relaxing activity which millions of people such as. There is also a particular pride when you know that you could grow your personal fruits and vegetables from your own yard. Vegetable gardening is actually ideal because it brings together regular gardening along with harvesting your own meals and saving money. The actual keys to an effective vegetable garden consist of planning ahead, understanding exactly what veggies you want to grow and can grow in your area, and including blossoms in your veggie garden for some colour.

Vegetable gardening is actually way more enjoyable than mowing the actual lawn! Vegetable gardening is actually no different than developing herbs or blossoms and if the correct steps are used and the vegetation is give the good care they will prosper and produce really tasty vegetables. Growing vegetables is a ability that can be discovered, and through exercise you will get much better. Throughout our web site you will find the garden tips as well as vegetable seeds that will help you grow your personal vegetable gardens.

Growing vegetables is not that costly to start and also the taste of home made veggies definitely outperform that of grocery store vegetables. Your growing vegetables days will be filled with produce if you take the correct precautions when growing and continue upkeep of your garden. Growing vegetables is very simple, but yet in some way refined. If you devote the effort, you are usually rewarded having a bountiful harvest. Growing vegetables is great enjoyable in early springtime when the weather conditions are cool and following we have invested most of the winter season imagining what the next garden will look like. I recieve excited about developing stuff that season and can't wait around to get the tiller out and search in.

Vegetable gardening is actually no different than developing herbs or blossoms and if the correct steps are used and the vegetation is give the good care they will prosper and produce really tasty vegetables. Growing vegetables is not that costly to start and also the taste of home made veggies definitely outperform that of grocery store vegetables. Your growing vegetables days will be filled with produce if you take the correct precautions when growing and continue upkeep of your garden. Growing vegetables is not just regarding raising produce for that table, though that's important. It is also regarding digging in the planet and coaxing seed products and transplants to create healthy veggies.

Growing vegetables is a organic way to supply healthy foods on your own or an entire loved ones. It is a price-effective, healthy way to give food to everyone. Vegetable gardening is actually honest work that will help mould somebody in to an honest lower-to--earth person. Growing vegetables is a great way to function that! With less than a $45 investment, you can save 100's of dollars this summer in your grocery bill!

Growing vegetables is back popular. The desire with regard to locally grown create, combined with financial pressures, has influenced homeowners to find out their yards. Growing vegetables is a well-liked pastime for many people within Florida. In addition to being enjoyable, the vegetables simply seem to flavor better when they are homegrown.

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