The one about.…The January cutting patch

“Born from winter dreaming, life stirs and the first tender shoots emerge from the earth. As the wheel turns, we feel the promise of spring and the dawning of a new beginning.”

My thoughts are turning to plans for the new Country Gate cutting patch now that we’re more than halfway through January. Currently it is more about dreaming, planning and looking at seed catalogues than doing too much outside, although it’s good to get out there and turn the compost, admire the seedheads and spot the green shoots. Whatever the time of year there are always some easy-to-grow, cottage garden plants doing their best to cheer us up. They are good for bees and other pollinators and often native to the British Isles.

In my column in a local mag in 2026, I will be featuring one plant every month, favourites from my childhood garden as a tribute to my mother who died twenty years ago. This month’s flowery garden hero is a European native and there’s no flower more evocative of the British winter than the humble snowdrop or Candlemas bell, so called because they are flowering prolifically by the feast of Candlemas at the start of February.

Clumps of these beauties are popping up already, their hardened leaf tips helping them to poke through the frozen soil of gardens, woodland and churchyards. Symbolic of innocence, purity and hope, they really are the perfect flower for January. When all the excess of Christmas has been cleared away, there’s an innate need to pare back and simplify and the snowdrop is a great poster flower for this.
I love looking out on my few clumps from the kitchen window and will be planning a snowdrop walk around nearby Lacock Abbey. I’d highly recommend you do similar.