plant first of this season’s potatoes
Get ready to plant the first of this season’s potatoes, starting by stocking up on seed potatoes from the mouthwatering selection now on sale at our garden centre here. You can risk planting fast-growing new (first early) potatoes from mid-March; slower-maturing second earlies and maincrops go in from early to mid-April. Save yourself some work – and backache – by [...]
Jobs for March 3
What to do in the garden in March: The main question this month is where to start! Don’t worry - we’ve got it sorted with our list of the essential jobs to be getting on with over the next few weeks. General tasks: Steep freshly-cut nettles in water for a few weeks and decant the rich brown liquid for a [...]
Prune coloured dogwoods
Prune coloured dogwoods to encourage a dazzling display of those vivid red stems again next year. Dogwoods are among the very best shrubs to choose for winter colour as their young growth has bark in vivid hues which shine out through the coldest months of the year, especially when back-lit by the low winter sun. The best scarlet is Cornus [...]
Plant a bumblebee garden
Plant a bumblebee garden to help our favourite black-and-yellow insects as they bustle about the garden pollinating our flowers and vegetables. We wouldn't get far as gardeners without them: they're responsible for the glistening displays of berries from autumnal stars such as cotoneaster, beauty berries, berberis and pyracantha; and even more importantly, they pollinate about a third of the crops [...]
Plants of the month for March 2
The plants of the month for March are pansies and violas, among our best-loved bedding plants and always popular for their cheery easy-going nature. Take the time to look closer at their prettily-marked petals and you'll find there's more to them than you think: like little works of art, you can find varieties splashed, shaded, two-toned, striped and whiskered, in [...]
Jobs for March 2
What to do in the garden in March: It's the busiest month of the year – your chance to kick-start the season in style. By the end of the month windowsills are groaning with seedlings and the garden is bursting into life – so let's get started! General tasks: Mulch bare soil in with lots of organic matter – well-rotted [...]
Move hardy seedlings gradually outdoors
Move hardy seedlings gradually outdoors from their cosy quarters in the greenhouse or cold frame from this week, ready for transplanting into their final growing positions in the open garden. Don't do the job in too much of a hurry, though. March can be a chilly month, and it's worth remembering that if you don't relish stepping from your nice [...]
Sow a meadow
Sow a meadow full of annual wildflowers for a glorious show of colour, even on poor, gravelly soil. Try centaury (Centaurium erythraea), marigolds, corncockle, field poppies, larkspur, wild pansies and lovely red anemone-like pheasant's eye (Adonis annua). You'll find mixes of these and many other wildflowers already selected for you in seed packs in our garden centre: just choose the [...]