CRAVEN College horticulture lecturer Michael Myers provides his February gardening journal

THE warm weather has certainly meant that many plants are flowering much earlier than normal.

The daffodils on my roadside verge have been out for several weeks now, well ahead of the snowdrops which are also earlier than is usual. Winter aconites too have been studding the ground with their bright yellow, cheery blooms since Christmas.

Colourful bulbs are one of the joys of the early spring garden with many providing better and better displays each year. Bulbs are versatile garden plants, equally at home in grass, under trees and shrubs or in more traditional borders, some are also excellent in containers.

As I mentioned last month I grow a wide variety of bulbs in my alpine house, mostly in terracotta pots plunged up to their necks in grit sand. Several dwarf irises are currently in full flower. Pots of crocuses too are beginning to pierce their gravel mulch with pointed buds.

Unlike irises, the crocuses need a warm, sunny day to open fully and so the alpine house is ideal for temping them to unfurl. In the garden a well-drained soil in a sunny position is a must and when planted en masse they are a sight to behold. Any visitors to Harrogate in the coming weeks cannot fail to be impressed by the drifts on crocuses on The Stray.

That other harbinger of spring, the snowdrop, is a great favourite of mine. In recent years the popularity of snowdrops has steadily increased with greater and greater sums paid for rare varieties each year. The current record stands at over £1,000 for one bulb but I am sure this will be eclipsed before long.

The beauty of snowdrops however is something that can be enjoyed by all, for like bluebells they will carpet the ground in huge drifts over time.

For the first time the National Gardens Scheme will be running a Snowdrop Festival with 115 gardens throughout the country opening in February up to March 6. Local gardens in the scheme include Austwick Hall, Sutton Gardens near Masham and Devonshire Mill near Pocklington.

Hodsock Priory also start their snowdrop open days this week whilst Goldsborough Hall, Kiplin Hall and Bridge Farm House are part of the new Yorkshire Snowdrop Trail, another new venture comprising a series of garden openings, lectures and plant sales next weekend, February 20 and 21.

Snowdrop enthusiasts or galanthophiles are just one of many groups of plant specific enthusiasts that collect the ever increasing range of forms available.

According to Alys Fowler in a recent newspaper column, snowdrops are last year's news, the next big thing are hepaticas, a group of woodland plants closely related to anemones. The price for a single, highly collectable hepatica in Japan has already passed one million Yen (nearly £6,000) and whilst this is exceptional, some of the more sought after varieties, as with snowdrops, command high prices.

The National Collection holder of hepaticas has organised a Hepatica Day in Silverdale, Lancashire on March 20 to help popularise these loveliest of woodland treasures.

The closely related hellebores are also coming into their own, their long lasting flowers in increasingly colourful combinations make them a stalwart of the winter garden. As the flowers start to show in the new year I remove the old leaves to better display the flowers, a time-consuming but very worthwhile chore.

At the college the saturated ground has made it difficult to find opportunities to prepare the vegetable plots for this season’s crops. Fortunately the sloping site does drain reasonably well and most of the beds are now prepared. Over the coming weeks seed sowing will gather pace and early potatoes will be encourage to shoot, a process known as chitting.

Salad crops and quick maturing vegetables are most popular with students so that they can be harvested before the end of the summer term, allowing them a share. Sweet peas grow alongside edible legumes and for once our autumn sowings look successful, whilst afforded the protection of the tunnel they are kept cool so that the plants do not become leggy.

Cut flowers are a great way to liven up a vegetable plot. Dahlia tubers and chrysanthemum stools can be brought into growth in a cool greenhouse now to encourage new growth. The new shoots are then a source of cuttings for the coming season.

We are also creating some new beds for soft fruit, whilst a delivery of bare-root roses should enrich the mixed borders in the summer. Preparation in gardening is the key to success and nowhere is this truer than in the herbaceous and mixed borders. Over the next few weeks many herbaceous perennials can be lifted and divided, invigorating and expanding the clumps for the forth-coming display. Early weed control and mulching can also reduce the time spent wading into borders as the plants and weeds vie for space through the summer, allowing more time to enjoy your garden.