Spring is bustin' out all over

A slight exaggeration perhaps, but when is the time to be full of optimism if not on New Year's Day?

Here is a selection of some of my favourite plants, at their best right now, in the depths of winter, yet redolent of the approaching spring.

Cornus sanguinea 'Midwinter Fire' – a summertime ugly duckling turns into a winter swan

Daphne bholua 'Jacqueline Postill' will fill the garden with fragrance for weeks

Galanthus 'Faringdon Double' an early snowdrop discovered in an Oxfordshire cemetery

Narcissus 'Cedric Morris' named by Beth Chatto for her friend the late artist-gardener

Salix alba var. vitellina 'Britzensis' positively glowing in the low winter sunlight

Winter heliotrope – a cloyingly perfumed thug but welcome for its early flowering