Hippeastrums are so flamboyant, they are bound to cheer up any garden in spring with their big, bold colourful blooms, shaped like huge trumpets.

They come in a spectacular range of colours too - deep red, pink, orange, yellow, white and even striped forms.

Hippeastrums have got to be one of the easiest bulbs to grow. They’re not fussy about soil, as long as it’s well drained. When it comes to displaying them, just a single bulb makes a simple yet marvellous potted feature.

In the garden, plant them in big clumps to make a real statement, spacing each bulb about 45 cm apart. You need a lot of bulbs to really make a show. If you’ve only got one or two, that’s OK, because here's a way you can magically turn a handful of bulbs into hundreds.

It’s a propagation technique called ‘cuttage’ where you cut the bulbs vertically into pieces - as many as you like. What’s important is that you have a bit of the thick basal plate on each section. The best time to do this in the early summer when the bulbs are well into their growth stage

It’s a good idea to dust the wedges with a fungicide to stop diseases. Then it’s simply a matter of planting them in a nice open mixture of sand and coir peat.

Within weeks, you’ll see little bulblets forming between the scales. Let them grow, and by next spring, they should be ready for repotting.