31. Get in a pickle for Boxing Day zing

32. Great gift – huge tub of blood, fish and bone

Having perused some of the Christmas gift ideas for the gardener in your family in the supplements and magazines, I wonder if I am really a gardener at all.

33. Gardening with the credit crunch

34. Stews to cut the bills

‘No fruits, no flowers, no leaves, no birds, November’.

Thomas Hood might have added to a 2008 version of his poem...  no money.

35. Get out on Boxing Day – and plan for next year

Christmas is a bustling time of year but there should be a chance on Boxing Day to get outside and at least look at the garden.

36. A holly bad show means a berry bad Christmas

Sometimes even in the smallest garden there are secret places that are seldom visited. I have a path at the side of my house which I see every week in summer when the lawns have to be mowed.

37. Flower ’bout that for taste in salads – nasturtium

Nasturtiums held a great fascination for me as a child because I was told you could eat them.

38. ‘Patty’s Plum’ poppy is so lovely I want to sing

Whenever I hear the name Gordon Brown the next line “texture like sun” comes unbidden into my head.

39. Basil – for taste of the Mediterranean

The weighty novels of the 19th Century occasionally refer to basil as flourishing when grown in dead men’s brains.

40. Yet another snail in the coffin of my aubergines

Vigilence in the vegetable plot is what is needed at the moment –  always a hard task for the weekend gardener.