It’s that time of year again. The clocks have gone forward, the evenings are getting longer and, as far as gardeners are concerned, we have officially been given an extra hour.
Okay, technically we haven't.
But let's not let facts get in the way of a good gardening opportunity.
Because daylight saving creates the wonderful illusion of having more time.
You finish work and look at the clock, 4.30pm, Plenty of time.
You have dinner to make, washing to do, things to organise and probably several responsibilities you have been successfully ignoring all day but there is still daylight.
So naturally, you go into the garden.
What will you do with your extra hour?
This is where the possibilities become endless.
You could finally repot that plant you've been meaning to get around to, you could deadhead the flowers, pull a few weeds and give everything a good drink.
Maybe you could plant something you've been keeping in a pot, harvest a few herbs or perhaps you'll just wander around looking at everything.
Which, let's be honest, is a perfectly legitimate gardening activity and made even better with a cocktail in hand.
There is always something to discover in a garden, a new leaf, a flower you hadn't noticed, a seedling popping up where it wasn't planted, a bee doing exactly what bees do and occasionally, a weed that has somehow achieved the size of a small shrub while you weren't looking.
The danger of the "extra hour"
Of course, there is a slight problem. The extra hour isn't actually extra and gardeners are notoriously bad at understanding this concept. You go outside at 5pm thinking you'll spend twenty minutes doing a quick job, Suddenly it's 6.30 and you've repotted three plants, moved six pots, pulled weeds, watered everything, taken photographs of a flower, started planning a new garden bed and somehow acquired another plant and forgotten all about dinner and all the everyday household jobs.
Perhaps the best thing about those longer evenings isn't actually getting more gardening done, maybe it's simply having more time to enjoy the garden.
To sit outside after a long day, have a cup of tea or a cocktail, to watch the light change, to listen to the birds, to notice what's flowering and to see what the garden is doing when we're not rushing through it.
Gardens aren't just places where we grow things, they're places where we slow down and daylight saving gives us a little more opportunity to do exactly that.
So, what are you going to do with your extra hour?
Are you going to tackle the jobs you've been avoiding? Start a new project? Pot up some plants? Plant something you've been waiting for? Or are you going to sit in the garden and do absolutely nothing?
Personally, I think they're all perfectly good uses of an extra hour.
Because whether it's technically an extra hour or simply an illusion of one, I'll happily take it.