Spring Forward!

Tuesday, 20 February 2024

Now that we are occasionally getting some sunny days, it is the perfect time to “Spring Forward” and start venturing outside into the garden again and here are some jobs, perfect for those early spring days…

Have a Spring clean!

Check over all your garden tools and make sure they are clean and sharp for the season ahead. Clean out old seed trays and pots and clean your greenhouse windows. Dig out the power washer and give those slabs and decks a good blast too.

Get Painting

Now is the perfect time of year, before plants start to get big again, to give fences, sheds, walls, decking. raised beds and furniture a lick of paint. It will extend their life as well as instantly making your garden look so much brighter.

Paint your fences to protect and make them look good

Prune roses

Start by removing any dead, diseased or dying branches as well as any that are crossing. Then thin any old growth that you don’t want. Finally, encourage new growth by removing up to a quarter from the top of the remaining healthy main stems.

Make your beds!

Just as it’s important to make your indoor bed in the mornings, so it’s important to keep ontop of your garden beds and borders and keep them neat and tidy! Remove all weeds, cut back old herbaceous and trim grasses and shrubs. Once you’ve done that add some soil enhancer such as a fine bark mulch or some manure, your plants will love you for it!

Add a fine bark mulch to improve the soil and help reduce weeds

Get planting

First Early potatoes take around 10 weeks to crop and you can plant them in late February into March in deep planting holes to protect them. Once the soil is beginning to warm, around mid-March, you can plant onions and shallots, if you want to avoid bolting, use a variety that’s less sensitive to cold weather.

Sow chilli and tomato seeds

If you have a heated greenhouse get some early seeds on the way. Don’t worry if you don’t, a sunny windowsill in the house will do just as well. Remember to have a check of what seeds you have left over from last year and what you need to buy this year so you are ready to sow the rest of your crops as soon as the temperatures rise.