March

Rudbeckia hirta ‘Maya’ is a fabulous award winning variety, bearing beautifully doubled golden daisies with petals so dense they almost look like pincushions. Golden yellow, with a kiss in the centre — almost like a Zinnia in appearance. An outstanding cut flower and wonderful in mixed containers.

Rudbeckia hirta ‘Large Flowered Mix’ produces a spectacular mix of giant double and semi-double daisy-like flowers that are carried on long stems and are perfect for cutting. In a spectacular mix of warm colours including golden-yellow, orange, bronze and mahogany, they flower profusely all summer long.

The heavy blooming ‘Irish Eyes’ has fantastic bright yellow and gold daisies with emerald green eyes, a far cry from your typical black-eyed Susan. It is easy to grow, great for cutting and offers lots of blooms in the heat of summer. This popular ornamental is at home in wildlife gardens, cutting gardens and mixed borders.

Rudbeckia hirta 'Denver Daisy' has large, golden daisies with chocolate brown centres and marks at the base of each petal. Growing to around 75cm (30in) tall, this lovely variety performs well, is exceptionally heat tolerant and blooms for a long time in summer.

Considered by many gardeners as the most complete border flower, when Rudbeckia ‘Cherry Brandy’ was first introduced, it took the plant world by storm. This stunning cultivar is the world’s first red Rudbeckia, it produces a mass of spectacular cherry-coloured blooms all summer long.

This attractive plant will be equally at home in the flower border or keeping company with the sage and thyme in your herb garden. Delightfully aromatic, the floral-peppermint scent is subtly different from other mints. Mountain mint is a great nectar plant, its honey is much sought after.

Prunella vulgaris is an interesting and quite beautiful little wildflower plant. The plants produce pretty blue-violet flowers in summer, the flowers freely produce nectar and are highly attractive to bees. If you’re looking for something to add to a meadow garden, or something for those shady areas this is the plant for you.

Venerating a former plant curator at the Royal Botanic Garden in Edinburgh, Scotland, 'Ron McBeath' is a beautiful new semi-dwarf cultivar. This diminutive potentilla repeat-flowers for months, sending up wands of rosy carmine flowers even in shade. It outlasts other potentillas by far.

Potentilla 'Helen Jane' is a beautiful new semi-dwarf cultivar that displays gorgeous crimson-eyed, bright pink flowers, with petals that are attractively crinkled just like crepe paper. Flowering over a long period, new buds open repeatedly in a long succession, from late June to September.

Collected at altitude in Japan and introduced in 2006, Polemonium yezoense 'Purple Rain' is one of the best new introductions in recent years. With bronze-purple lacy foliage, dark stems and violet-blue flowers, it is the darkest flower form of Polemonium available.

The white form of the lovely Jacobs Ladder, named after the slender, fresh green leaflets arranged like the rungs of a ladder. Blooming in late spring to early summer, the bright foliage and white flowers will brighten shady locations. Both the flowers and the attractive ferny foliage are excellent for cutting.

The physostegia has prolific dazzling tubular flower spikes which are arranged on distinctly square stems. This oddly named perennial is perfect for the middle of a mixed or herbaceous border. The flowers are on swivels that can be bent right or left on the stem - a useful feature for floral displays.

The Cape Gooseberry is a useful small crop for the home garden. The fruit is expensive to purchase as it is labour intensive in commercial plantings. Very easy to grow from seed, it can overwinter outdoors in mild areas or when grown in favoured positions such as the foot of a sunny wall.

Tall garden phlox are a beauty to behold, the large, dense flower clusters, produced in abundance during summer. Phlox Hybrids Mix is a perennial, cultivated strain. The colours are wonderful, the sweetly fragrant, evening scent is captivating and they are very easy to grow.

Phlox drummondii grandiflora 'Isabellina' is an annual flowering phlox that is very easy to grow. Fast to flower it produces abundant blooms with a light melon fragrance. The clusters of creamy, linen-yellow flowers are the colour of condensed milk. A must-have for wedding work, this delicious variety is a great addition to the garden border and bouquets.

Phlox is one of the most useful of annuals, they are extremely rewarding garden subjects and lack real competition in the late summer garden. Uniform, with outstanding weather tolerance they will flower from mid July right through the summer until October. Perfect for wedding work and bouquets, Grandiflora 'Alba' provides pure white flowers combined with a delicious scent.

'Sugar Stars' is a fabulous new annual Phlox variety that blooms with a confection of purple-blue and white clustered blooms. One of the most useful of annuals they flower from mid July right through to October. For spectacular display, romantic excess and sweet fragrance, they are without peer.