With April showers fast approaching, it's the time of year when I turn to choosing which plants I want to grow from seeds.

Seeds are an invaluable resource, where ever possible I'll be using a thrifty alternative to buying them in packets. I find it easier to obtain seeds from fruit and veg that I buy fresh every week on my local market greengrocers (they have less storage room so produce is normally fresh and locally sourced).

Fruit and vegetables:

• Tomatoes - easy ones these. When seeds are bought in packs, they can cost anything up to £2.99 for 20 seeds - buying a tomato from my local market, I can get around 50 seeds for just 20p
  I am planting out regular and cherry varieties, using the recycled greenhouse I got last year.
  Last year's late planting in the greenhouse, yielded a good crop of both cherry and regular tomatoes right into early November, so early planting should see us through the hotter summer months (he says hopefully!)
• Sweetcorn - I spotted them growing on one of my Dad's friends allotment last year, (I was there to rob some free comfry) they were growing to around 9 foot tall planted in triangles, in sandy untreated earth, in an uncovered area open to winds.
  I planted some into seed pots as late as September last year, to see if I could grow them in the greenhouse, they came on a treat with simple watering.
  I planted them out in the October and they grew to over 2 feet tall before the colder weather got them, so early planting this year will help.
  Fresh corn on the cob from my local market - 50p for around 100 seeds.
• Potatoes - I am going for two varieties in 2010 - King Edwards and the smaller new potatoes.
  Last year I grew some king edwards, but a neighbour's fuscia bushes roots, grew in my border like a spiders web and killed them off. It did however break up my soil and now I have excellent fine soil where last year it had lots of clay in it.
  For 2010 I will be planting them out in my "veg box" where I normally grow my peapods. The soil there is very thick and clumpy, so even if they don't do well, it will leave me with a box of fine soil ready for 2011.
  Seed wise, quartering up some old potatoes and leaving them in a carrier bag in the greenhouse for a few weeks should get them to root, they will then be ready for planting out - you can of course save potato peelings and dip them in rooting powder and plant them out, which proves to be just as successful.
• Strawberries - for the last two years, my six little cuttings I got from my dad's allotment have come on well, producing plenty of fruit, and spreading well, now I have about 20 plants for this year. I am concerned though, as I have been reliably informed that around every 3 years, I should dig up and destroy the older strawberry plants to leave room for the younger ones to grow and develop.
  This way, the fruit thats produced remains firm and fresh and keeps the strawberry plot in tip top condition?
  I plan to leave it well alone this year, just shaving it around the edges with the lawn mower to keep it in check, I will mark the older plants later in the season and remove them around September time, hopefully, the newer plants will root out in their place and next year's crop will be good?
• I have two remaining bays to fill with some topsoil and plant out - not sure what to do with them, as they get half a days sun, half a days shade.
  In my borders I will hopefully have some sweetcorn planted out, there will be room for carrots and the veg I have never successfully grown - beetroot!
  The soil is fine there now and the fuscia roots have been dug up and won't be coming back, so maybe it's time to try again?

Blackberries - last year, alongside the house where we have extended it, an old blackberry branch I planted about 3 years ago sprouted up and produced around 4 big bowls full of blackberries!
I cropped it slightly and pinned it to some lats I screwed onto the fence, which allows it to creep along and support itself. I am hoping it will develop into a hedge that helps the local wildlife and birds as well as providing me with plenty of fruit.
My thinking is, that it will be an excellent burglar deterrant?

With a full year to go at with my recycled greenhouse, I should have a more profitable year as regards fruit and veg, I have divided the borders up into 6 bays in the back garden, two are free as yet to plant out in.
The grapevines (cuttings I took when I moved the greenhouse from the garden it was left in neglected) grew well last year, in milk bottles in our kitchen, then once the greenhouse was in place, continued to do well, getting as high as two feet tall.
However wether they will continue or "come back" to life this year, remains to be seen.
I am told they shut down in winter, like old dead twigs, then come to life once the heat returns the next year?
We shall see, but whatever happens, I am hoping that my trusted comfry water, fed to all the plants once every five waterings, will fire all my seeds up and give us a bumper crop.