Imagine you’ve brought home a tray of little petunia plants in April, thinking how lovely they’ll look in your window box tucked around that lonely lavender. But be patient! First of all pot them on into slightly bigger individual pots of compost. Then, keep them somewhere sheltered and frost free during the day, but bring them into a cool place indoors at night. This is called hardening off, getting them gradually accustomed to outdoor conditions after weeks spent under glass. After a few days of this, you can leave them out all night, as long as there’s no frost forecast. Only then should you plant them in that window box, using plenty of fresh compost, which will keep them fed for the next six weeks. After that, feed every week or two (slow-release granules are good, or use a liquid tomato feed) until the end of the summer. Do this, keep your containers watered, and you’ll have strong, healthy plants that will flower until October or November.

Some bedding plants benefit from pinching out when they’re young, with just a few sets of leaves. Anything that will eventually become a bushy plant: bedding fuchsias, cosmos, tobacco plants, petunias, sweet peas, marigolds, pelargoniums, snapdragons and more. To do it, literally pinch out the growing tip between your fingers, which encourages the plant to develop more side shoots, thus a healthier, fuller, bushier habit – and more flowers.