April – It’s Easter and everything is growing

From now on, it’s full steam ahead in the garden. Here’s a few ideas to set you on your way:

• Many vegetable plants can be planted now: some will need overnight protection outside, others need to stay in the greenhouse for now.
• Flowering summer bedding plants can go outside when the risk of frost is low. Rather than wait until well into May, most decide to take a risk from late April to give them a head start.
• No need to wait for planting shrubs and trees; they should go into the ground now. Everything grows swiftly in late spring, so you will see healthy new growth in a matter of weeks.
• Herbaceous perennial (cottage garden plants) will take off very quickly. Ranging from the smallest ground-cover alpines to others which can reach 1.5m, there is wonderful choice which will give you a mass of colour this year – and in future years.
• If you have put off pruning during the winter waiting for warmer weather, now is your chance. Evergreen shrubs and perennials will benefit from a tidy-up, as usual removing dead or diseased wood. Trim back beautiful yellow forsythia after flowering, and camellia also if they are unruly after producing their magnificent flowers.
• The wet and mild winter means that moss has proliferated on lawns. If this worries you, apply a moss killer with your lawn feed and weedkiller to keep it under control.

Don’t be overwhelmed in the spring. Just do enough for gardening to be enjoyable!

David Hogg

Buckland Nurseries