Gardening in spring: 10 ways to wake up your garden

1 Spray-paint the canes or sticks that support your climbing veg with your favourite colour, or try a harlequin mix of primary or pastels for added zap. Put some low-visibility netting discreetly at the foot of the supports to help them reach the top faster. Try fan-training colourful varieties of climbing beans up a bit of fence or wall by planting three or five bean plants together at the bottom and taking each one out at a different angle along painted cane to create a fan. Or use tall sunflowers as supports – get the sunflowers established early and when they are a good 2ft or more plant a climbing bean at the base.

2 Get some multicoloured Orpington chickens. These softies are beautiful, biddable and bonny. The famous buff varieties are coveted, but mix them with other Orpingtons: blue, black, jubilee, partridge and splash to create a splendidly nostalgic image under your apple trees. Viv Cairns (078 7517 0233; near Grantham) has the best-coloured choice of available Orpingtons I have ever come across.

3 Scare off those pigeons and deer with a multicoloured scarecrow. Stuff a well- co-ordinated range of your brightest, oldest and preferably smelliest items from your outgoing winter wardrobe and dress a couple of batons fixed at right angles to each other in an appropriate position. Do not be tempted to wash the clothes first, the smell of human odour is the best for deterring deer. Activate your scarecrow regularly by using him to air your tracksuit after a hard workout.

4 For a simple, long-flowering, hardy plant for plugging gaps in borders, Verbena 'Seabrook's Lavender' produces pale violet flowers from May to December. It's easy from cuttings too.

A taller, aristocratic, annual bedding plant with chutzpah that punches out the colour is Cleome 'Señorita Rosalita'. A good 2ft high, its lavender-pink flowers are produced all the way up the stems, not just at the top. Also unusually for a cleome, it has no thorns and does not produce seeds so it is propagated from cuttings. It does well in sunny, dry conditions or will flourish in containers, too.

5 Clean up those slabs! Boring I know, but it really can make a huge difference, so get out the knee pads and chemicals (such as Geocel's Ecochem) or hire a pressure washer and do it. When using a pressure washer, remember to wash across the joints, rather than running up and down them, which can damage them. Also, do a trial piece first to check the slabs are not eroded. If all else fails, contact Andy Whiting of Spinaclean (01604 759201; www.spinaclean.com) He sells surface cleaners or will clean yours for you, using the heavy-duty, highly efficient machines.

6 Set a bust in your hedge. Peter Evans Studios (01582 725730) are props and scenery makers and have a massive range of highly convincing plastic moulded items from mini lion's heads, to Doric columns. Busts start at £40. The plastic moulded surface will take a wide range of faux paint finishes: lead, bronze, verdigris. Mount the head on a pole, then drive this into the ground in the hedge with an ''alcove'' cut in the foliage to set it off.

7 Dress up your outdoor table. Make a runner from a snazzy fabric to run across the width of the table, sewing weights in the ends to keep it in place. It adds a splash of colour, yet saves continually washing table cloths. Get some (at least three, maybe seven depending on the length) small, identical terracotta pots or similar to run down the middle of the table and paint them in a colour to complement the runner. Plant them up with easy summer succulents such as echeverias. Keep to one cultivar for maximum impact.

8 Make your children a summer tee pee. Get some stout canes and bright fabric. Apply a waterproofing spray (such as Nikwax Tent and Gear Solar Proof, available at camping shops), add bunting and a skull and cross bones flag to warn off the enemies. A low willow fence will define the encampment and add a fire pit if you dare.

9 Labels showing variety, sowing date and company for veg and flowers are invaluable. Do not make them discreet, as hunting them out is a chore. Be bold and go for the glorious technicolour range from Wells and Winter at 3 pence each. (01626 821044; www.wellsandwinter.co.uk)

10 At last, a biodegradable plant pot! Try the new funky coloured pots from Haxnicks (0845 241 1555; www.Haxnicks.co.uk) Available in four co-ordinating colours: aqua, bamboo, earth and olive, they are sturdy, but will biodegrade; they have a life of about three years. If you want potatoes, tomatoes and other vegetables in containers that look good, why not just plant them in reused black poly pots but disguise them with hessian, also available from Haxnicks. Wrap the hessian around the pots and secure with their hessian ribbon on a roll. The hessian and ribbon are available in natural, crimson or green.