Everyone loves a British tomato. So why not grow your own tomatoes? I know you all think about it but you just do not know how to go about doing it and if it is easy. I often am asked these sorts of questions this time of year.

I know that a lot of you do grow your own tomatoes but there is an obstacle that keeps arising and I want to help you get over that so I have some tips for you that will help you grow perfect tomatoes.

To stop your tomatoes from spindling and producing little fruit that is actually mature you should consider the soil that you use and the temperature of the soil. Tomatoes love to be grown in soil that is nice and warm and they need 8 hours of sunlight a day so make sure they have that, and that they are not in a shadow at any point. Test that the pH of the soil is between pH 6.0 and pH 7.0. Make sure the soil is well drained, if the soil stays too wet when you water the tomatoes then build a raised bed for them if there is nowhere else they can go.

One of the best ways to help keep your lawn green and lush is to throw fresh compost on it twice or three times a year. It is organic and safe which is why many people choose to do this and they are not throwing chemicals on it all the time, which can be better.

Compost is seen as a great fertilizer as it contains lots of nutrients such as nitrogen and potassium. Other benefits include if you put too much on it won’t burn your grass out, in comparison to chemicals, and it does not stain your paved areas.

Make sure when you are applying the compost that you used very fine compost, and you must remember to spread the compost evenly across the whole lawn. You can use a rake to help you do this. Then all you need to is water the lawn and leave it for a week, which means no mowing the lawn, which you will be pleased to hear undoubtedly.

There are many ways to kill snails and slugs, they have been thought up and tried and tested since the beginning of time (probably) as they have been the bane of our garden’s existence for that long. All of the solutions have been tried but some are more effective than others. I’m going to tell you about my favorite ways.

If you only have a few, then you can hand pick them and throw them over your garden fence.

Stale beer or yeast can be used to lure them out of the garden’s flower beds as they are attracted to this. Or if you have a husband or a boyfriend just make them sleep outside and they’ll breathe out the fumes.

Snails and slugs cannot stand copper. It gives them a tiny electrical shock whenever they come into contact with it. It won’t kill them but it is fun to know that they cannot enter a certain area surrounded by copper, like vampires and garlic. So place copper around an area, or across a border that you do not want the snails and slugs to cross.

If your pond has been growing cloudy and mouldy and full of algae and you’ve pondered (pardon the pun) what could be wrong, and if you are anything like me and have fish in your pond and you cannot see them anymore then look no further we have the answer.

In the warmer weathers of spring algae love to flourish in ponds and this is what causes the misty water. Obviously nature has its own solution to the problem which is that the pond plants will begin to grow, which are oxygenating plants, and these will eat up the nutrients reducing the volumes of algae in the pond. If you want to speed up nature’s process then you can throw a string bag of barley straw into the pond. This will breakdown much quicker and the nutrients will be used up by this extra barley straw. Remove the barley straw after a few months.

There is a hipe going on at the moment and we are in the middle of it - growing plants vertically on walls. Green Walls and Green Roofs are becoming their popular names for people living in inner cities and have flat roofs and walls and want to have a planted garden rather than completely bricked areas. People know it is better for their health in many ways to have a garden.

One question that has been raised is how to stop a plant rooting into a wall. The answer is a bit electric in that plants will take the easiest path much like electricity does.

To stop plants from penetrating a wall when in search for water is quite an easy one to answer. If you provide a water supply for the plants at the bottom of your wall near your plants roots then they will not keep growing in search of water and thus not root themselves into your wall.

The world’s largest green wall was unveiled at the Expo 2005, featuring the Bio-Long in Japan, the wall is 200 metres, 15 metres high and has 200 different species of plants growing on it totalling a 200,000 plant population altogether.

Green roofs in the UK are (pardon the pun) growing in popularity and becoming more and more common according to Dave Auster at Greenfix Sky Gardens who are UK Green Roof specialists.

Nightclub owner Billy Reilly is opening a roof terrace venue called Pacha, let’s hope that more nightclubs follow suit and cover their clubs in foliage.

In cities across Germany it is becoming law that flat-roofed buildings must have a green roof, and the overall roof coverage is said to be growing by more than 13 million square metres a year. In the UK it is expected that future UK planning regulations for roofs are starting to move in the same direction as the Germans with new buildings being required to have a portion of their roof surface area be dedicated for green walls and roofs.

At the Chelsea Flower Show this year the most talked about topics are going to be planted walls and green roofs, and will be presented in a number of show gardens.

Growing and planting on roofs has its advantages including being environmentally friendly by reducing pollution. They help insulate buildings as well as provide habitat for wildlife. With the Green effort happening in the media and the world at the moment growing plants on your roof will certainly help you build a greener home.

The Centre for Sustainable Development located at the University of Cambridge has suggested that a layer of plants or vegetation on a roof can reduce heat loss from houses and other buildings, reducing wind chill factor by 75% and the demand for the heating being switched on by 25%.

Not only is there the eco-friendly advantages of such growing of plants and vegetation but there is also the visual impact of making a building more beautiful, as well as the associated pleasure of accomplishing this. It will also reduce noise that can be heard from inside the building as well as have a positive effect on people’s health.

Native plants are of course plants that are believed or known to have existed in this country and the British Isles for hundreds if not thousands of years.

There are not any rules about having native plants in your garden for producing the best type of nectar. In fact Marina say there are thousands of great plants to choose from that produce excellent levels of nectar and they do not all originated from in the British Isles.

Buddleja is one such non-native plant that many garden lovers have in their garden which has proven year on year to produce great levels of nectar, providing food for loads of insects and butterflies. Buddleja is known as the Butterfly Bush in fact.

Of course there exist great native plants too, native woody plants (for example trees and shrubs) provide support for a large amount of insects that then provide a fantastic food source for a large number of animals.

It is said that animals do not discriminate between native and non-native plants for food, so it is entirely up to you whether you choose to plant and grow native or non-native plants. It is recommended that you still choose plants that offer great colour, shape, nectar-richness and berries, so that you will still attract a large amount of wildlife to your garden.

If you are fed up of your wife nagging you about cutting the lawn, here is a great excuse for you. Long lawns left for weeks with no cutting at all can be a great habitat for grasshoppers, other insects and beetles. It is also a great source of food for butterflies and caterpillars. You can always try it as an excuse anyway, it probably will not be very effective. Although Marina do recommend a corner of your lawn be left to grow longer for those reasons.

If your lawn is looking bland and you want to add some colour to it then try planting some meadow flowers in your garden lawn, such as oxe-eye daisies and cowslip. They provide loads of pollen to a diverse set of insects as well as nectar, and it will make your lawn more interesting.

Really cramming your bed’s borders with nectar-rich plants will provide your visiting bees and insects with plenty of food. Through the cold winter months birds and other animals will need lots of food and to create the extra interest for them it is a great idea to allow perennial seed heads to develop around your borders. If you plan your flower borders in a sunny and sheltered area you will see the best effect of this, and if you choose flowers which flower at different times of the year you are ensuring that a continuous supply of flowers and thus their nectar are supplied all year round.

Marina endorses the growing of members of the carrot family for such effects. The carrot family can be found with eryngiums, cow parsley and astrantias.

“Cow parsley is fertilised by bees and flies, and attracts lacewings and hoverflies which eat aphids. From an aesthetic point of view, Marina recommends the daisy family, including asters, achilleas and chrysanthemums, and new varieties of echinaceas which are wonderful for attracting bees, hoverflies and butterflies.”