Is Prince Harry cut out for the Chelsea Flower Show? If one had read the story on 1 April, one would have given a loud guffaw and applauded the prankster who thought it up. But there seems to be real substance to the rumour that was first reported in Horticultural Week in October, that Prince Harry, apocryphally on first name terms with every night club bouncer in Chelsea, could be among the exhibitors at next year's Chelsea Flower Show. As the panel of judges of the Royal Horticultural Society sit down to vet applications for the 2013 show, they may be considering, with as much objectivity as they can, the claims of the Prince, third in line to the Throne, who is rumoured to have applied to exhibit in the showpiece central avenue with a garden commissioned by his Sentebale children's charity, based in Lesotho. "Clearly some of his father's passion for gardening has rubbed off - although I don't think Harry will be talking to any plants," says a friend of the Prince. But if it has rubbed off, and Harry is a secret nurturer of tulips and begonias, he has been hiding his light under a bushel with rare skill. Harry the helicopter pilot we know and admire. Harry the party animal we know and tolerate. But Harry the raker and mulcher and dead-header and executor of other lowly horticultural tasks? The idea takes a bit of getting used to. Still, if his application does get the nod from the RHS judges, he will not be working alone. Jinny Blom, Prince Charles's favourite landscape gardener a former Chelsea gold-medal winner, has reportedly been appointed to create the princely garden. If she cannot help Harry tell a daffodil from a chrysanthemum in six months, nobody can. Less auspicious, perhaps, is the rumour that the DIY chain B & Q will sponsor the garden. Will we be seeing the Prince give a demonstration of a branded hedge-trimmer? As for the likely horticultural content of Harry's garden, one can only speculate at this stage. But given that "sentebale" means "don't forget me" in Sotho, the national language of Lesotho, one can cautiously assume that that old English favourite, the forget-me-not, will feature prominently. Or as Harry must learn to call it, if he is going to hobnob with the grandees of the RHS, the Myosotis arvensis. Somehow it is hard to imagine the Latin name tripping off the Prince's tongue. He is at the bottom of a VERY steep learning curve.