SUN-loving Ray Wallace thought his dreams of the perfect garden had gone to seed - until a team of green fingered TV experts helped him turn over a new leaf!

Miracle workers from Channel 5's Instant Gardens transformed Ray's garden into an low maintenance Eden in just two days. The finished product boasts a 5,000 gallon pond, a circular lawn, a landscaped grass mound, an arbour, an archway and silver birch trees.

Ray, of Fairhaven Close, Great Sankey, was no mean gardener himself until he was disabled by rheumatoid arthritis. Since then he has spent every hour he can on his beloved plot with his wife Pauline, his mum Olive - and their eight cats and two dogs.

Ray, aged 49, said: "My mum and me spend most of our time in the garden. But since I became disabled I've not been able to do anything to it - I even had to get someone to cut the grass.

"I entered a competition last year where I had to say in 100 words why I thought my garden should be made over. When they contacted me more than a year later, I thought it was a wind-up!"

Now Ray and his garden will star in a new series of the TV programme to be screened in the spring. When presenter Jac Flower and her team visited Ray, they were fresh from tending the blooming blossoms of page three glamour girl Melinda Messenger!

Added Ray: "What they achieved in two days is unbelievable. My neighbours are green with envy!"

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