Unfortunately, this time of year is when us gardeners have to start getting down and dirty!

There’s no other way around the fact ‘The flowers that bloom in the Spring Tra-La’ – as sung in comic opera ‘The Mikado’ – are accompanied a thousand-fold of weeds.

If you’ve been liberal with mulching your workload will be much lighter, but there will always be renegades that beat the system.

On the bright side, they may make good compost.

I’m very partial to daisy bushes. In fact, I’m very partial to any plant that’s ‘no fuss’ and appears to have no problems or predators.

They give us so much colour for so little effort.

Hybridisers have given us new colours and varieties of daisy bushes, and garden centres are only too pleased to sell them – or they’re easily grown from cuttings.

I feel two seasons is all we should expect from a daisy bush, so keep a few cuttings growing on.

If you’re about to plant a rose here’s a hint to help it survive in the hot, dry summer we’re told to expect.

Dig the hole at least double the depth of the root-ball and fill it two-three times with water and allow to soak in. Soak a whole newspaper until sodden and line the bottom of the hole.

Then fill with compost to the correct depth, plant the rose and surround with a mixture of soil and compost, and water in. You now have an insurance policy beneath the plant and hopefully it will withstand dry spells.