We use normal composting bins and as we generate a lot of green waste they work quite well. I have used hot composters and if you manage the mix of ingredients and the moisture levels they are very effective for smaller gardens.

Our native field maple (acer campestre) is a good tree for wildlife. But for year-round interest and wildlife value it is hard to beat crab apples, malus.

Hello Jane, Trachelospermum have enjoyed the changing milder climate but can be hit  by severe cold, so the usual advice is to wait until early spring. If it has long straggly growths they can be trimmed back now – but save the harder pruning until after the winter but before birds start nesting. Late February to early March is ideal.

Hello Juliet, it is a Teucrium x lucidrys, commonly called Hedge Germander which is often sold as a herb. We are propagating some this year which will be ready for next summer.

It’s frustrating but box is really suffering so we are looking to replace our box hedging too. We have already planted some Euonymus japonicus ‘Jean Hughes’ as a trial which you can see near the visitor exit in the walled garden.

The RHS did an experimental planting at Wisley of a large range of dwarf shrubs, so take a look at their website.

In shaded areas glossy leaves reflect the light and add interest all year round which is why plants such as Aucuba are so popular. We have a national collection at Winterbourne to show the range of leaves shapes and leaf colour you can get from this evergreen. Camellias are also good if you can ensure they have enough water plus they flower through winter and early spring to give colour at a quiet time of the year.

Trying to protect roses from deer is not easy as they do love the young shoots. Planting woody shrubs in front of the roses as a barrier does slow them down and some of the older varieties of rose with more thorns is another way of having rose flowers rather than feeding deer.  Using supports around the roses or using climbing roses on supports in the border can elevate the flowers above the grazing line.

Unfortunately not but anecdotally I have seen people using seaweed foliar feeds sprayed onto plants as a supposed deterrent, and Chester Zoo did market a product made from lions’ dung as a product to keep other animals away from susceptible plants.

Gravel is an essential component in this situation mixed in with a loam based soil. Then you can select plants like the candelabra Primulas to plant in this mix.

We sow a range of plants for flower such as wallflowers, foxgloves, honesty, sweet rocket and sweet william plus edibles like chard, garlic, and winter lettuce. Also autumn-sown sweet peas give you a head start next year.

We start all these under cover, so having a greenhouse or cold frame is a great asset for autumn sowing but not essential.

Magnolias and Crab Apples seem the most tolerant of this challenging combination. We will be looking at expanding on this advice as we find out ourselves how plants have coped with these extremes this year.

Great question! The classic starter vegetables are; lettuce, radish, spring onion, courgette, beetroot, potato, runner bean, leeks, broad beans and chard. The Royal Horticultural Society website is a great place for inspiration, and you’ll find some fellow vegetable growers on social media who give a running account of the highs and lows of vegetable growing.

My top tips include buying good quality seed, preparing the ground and keeping an eye out for any pests and diseases that may try and affect the growing plants. Start small and try container growing if you haven’t got much space. Good luck!

The recent years have highlighted many plants that struggle with extremes of moisture that we have experienced in the country, but there are a few winners.

Roses have proved amazingly resilient and have come back into fashion because of their hardiness and tolerance of extreme conditions.

Magnolias are another group of shrubs and trees for climate change gardens.

Continuing the woody theme, crab apples will provide year around interest and if they are underplanting with hard geraniums will give some extra floral highlights in the garden.

Keep an eye out on our new planting areas at Winterbourne, as we will be trialling plants that we’re hoping will show how they cope with these fluctuating moisture levels.

Bindweed is extremely difficult to eradicate as you have found. Pulling away the twining stems to limits its growth is the best way to manually control its spread, as well as winter digging to tease out as many of the white brittle running roots as possible to limits its effect.

Heavy mulching in spring and planting vigorous plants such as herbaceous geraniums between shrubs can also have some effect, this is the general advice as we all try to reduce our use of herbicides.

There are two main types of bamboo, clump forming and spreading. Clump forming grow each year and increase in size around a central clump. Spreading bamboos send runners out from the central stump and need controlling from an early age.

The use of a strong membrane dug in around the main bamboo plant is the preferred method of containment and you can buy a specific material that will withstand these thuggish colonisers. There are some beautiful clump forming bamboos that don’t require anything other than some thinning of the canes to open up the view so choose them and enjoy without worrying they will take over the whole garden. The Bamboo Society of GB is a fantastic website and worth looking at!

You are doing everything right. Cut back in the summer all the whippy growths and prune further in the winter to two or three buds from the main stem. For the few flowers either feed with a high potash fertiliser in the spring or consider buying a named clone that you know will flower from an early age.

Unfortunately, some wisterias, because they are grafted on to a rootstock have lost the grafted cultivar top and the rootstock, which is an inferior clone, takes over and is poor flowering.

Look up the National Collection of Wisterias or the Frank P Matthews website to see what varieties are on offer as they can be the most beautiful garden plant if you get the right cultivar.

As it is still a small plant after three years, I would suspect it has a poor root system. Philadelphus, or Mock Oranges, are tough, scented flowering shrubs that, if given the right start should put on two feet of growth each year.

There are dwarf varieties that are very slow growing, but if you are after a big shrub I would remove, prepare the soil and plant a new named cultivar such as Belle Étoile. There is a trial of Philadelphus cultivars at RHS Bridgewater, so keep an eye on that for some new varieties in the future.