Peter Dowdall: Love your garden centre

Independent garden centres are local businesses, run by people who know their stuff, who often grow their own or source locally grown stock

Independent garden centres are local businesses, run by people who know their stuff.  File picture

We're into April now, and if you're anything like me, you've already been drawn into a garden centre at least once. The car parks are full, the trolleys are piled high with colour and trays of bedding plants glow like something from a dream, cerise, cobalt blue, butter yellow and somewhere between the patio roses and the clematis, you've already fallen a little bit in love with something that you have no business buying.

That's fine, that's what garden centres are for, but before you load the boot and head home full of hope and optimism, I want you to stop for a moment and think about the garden you actually have, not the one you'd like to have and not the one on the label.