Remember, remember.... the fifth of November!

It's bonfire season in the garden, so get ready for Fireworks Night in style by collecting all your garden waste and stacking it all up to send up in smoke. It's a great excuse to have a get-together, bake some (home-grown) potatoes and enjoy setting off a few rockets while giving your garden a good tidy, too. Garden centres have got all you need for your perfect fireworks night , from garden incinerators to firelighters.

If you've already got a pile ready for the bonfire, move it to a new site before setting light to it, as there may be hedgehogs, grass snakes or toads underneath getting ready to settle down for winter. And take care where you start your fire: it's illegal to allow smoke to blow across a road, and it's considerate to your neighbours to avoid smoke blowing in their direction.

You can burn anything woody, including rose and hedge prunings and nasty weeds like bindweed and ground elder. And the ash, after it's cooled, makes fantastic potash-rich plant food: spread it over the ground around your currants or add it to your compost bin to give your garden a boost next year.