When the buds are reappearing on the trees and bulbs are blossoming into havens of colour, make sure you’re not looking out on your neighbours’ gardens with envy. If you take action now, you could welcome the season with your own drifts of snowdrops, daffodils, tulips or some cheery crocuses.

Bulbs virtually take care of themselves so they will multiply and flourish for years without much interference. This sort of gardening is very forgiving and you don’t need green fingers to achieve great results.

Get going
Now is the time to buy. If you are unsure, ask for advice; there’s a lot more for spring than just daffodils, muscari and snowdrops.

Bulbs and corms (which are like bulbs but don’t have the fleshy leaves you would find on a bulb and the bud is on top) tend to be an inexpensive way to add masses of colour to your garden. The more you buy the cheaper they are but make sure they are healthy and free from mould.

The right look
Too much formality doesn’t work with spring flowers – they should look natural and carefree. When planting bulbs in beds, try not to make them look formal and studied. Simply drop a handful of bulbs on freshly dug earth and plant them in bulb fibre where they fall. If you really do want to add some formality to your beds, don’t use even numbers of bulbs – five, seven or nine will always look more pleasing to the eye than four, six or eight. The same rule applies with any planting. Be sure to mix some dwarf varieties for greater effect.

When planting up tubs and containers layer them; the biggest ones can go in near the bottom and the smaller ones at the top. Don’t worry, they will all find their way up to the surface to give a great display. Give them a weak feed of tomato food every two weeks.

So much on offer
There is so much more to spring planting than just daffodils and narcissi, although they are quite spectacular. Both come in a great variety of shapes and forms from trumpet and split coronas to double crowns. Not to be outdone tulips can be had in simple beautiful single flowers, double bloom peony types and the flamboyant frilled and twisted petals of ‘parrot’ tulips.

You can also plant muscari or grape hyacinth, crocus, cyclamen, hyacinths, fritillarias and snowdrops. Strictly speaking, some of these are corms but they all behave in a similar vein, storing their energy in a bulbous form.

There are lots of other smaller bulbs that are ideal for planting under shrubs and will provide spectacular showings. These include wood anemones, chinodoxas and scillas. Once these have finished flowering, they will die back until the following year.

Bulbs for indoors
A bowl of scented hyacinths or miniature daffs can be absolutely lovely at Christmas time, so get the pots out now.

Bulbs intended for indoors can be planted much more thickly, actually touching each other, and they will give a better display than if growing outside. They don’t need to be planted as deeply as those in the garden: leave half of the bulb exposed. It is important to keep them in the dark until they have sprouted. If they are going to be in artificial light in the meantime, you’ll need to create a night/day situation otherwise they will bolt to the light, go all straggly and often fail to produce decent flowers, if any.

So, if you want to have a display to equal or surpass that of your neighbours, get to a garden centre or DIY store and stock up.

Happy planting!