Flower Garden

• After a wet spell mulch around camellias, rhododendrons and azaleas to help conserve moisture to ensure good flowering next year
  
• Tie in new shoots on clematis, jasmine and climbing and rambling roses. Rose shoots should be kept as level as possible to promote growth of side shoots
  
• Sow sweet pea seeds outside or plant out those you have grown over winter. Put the climbing structure, either a wigwam of frame with netting, in place. Put two seeds or plants to each cane
  
• If you have a light soil you can start making sowings of hardy annuals. Sow into straight seed drills as this makes it easier to take out any weeds that will grow. Once the flowers are in bloom you will not be able to see the rows
  
• Put in supports for perennials to grow through before they become too large. Use frames sold for this purpose and once the plants mature they will be hidden by the foliage
  
• The more tender plants that had their stems left on to protect the crowns such as fuchsias and penstemons can now be pruned taking care not to cut out any new growth
  
• Keep dead heading daffodils and tulips taking off only the flower and seed head
  
• Buy seedlings and plug plants ready to grow on for your hanging baskets and containers
  
• On warm days open the vents and doors of your greenhouse and damp down the floor
  
• Start to feed fish in the ornamental pond

 
Lawns

• April is the best month to apply weed killer or moss killer
  
• Apply a spring fertilizer  to help green up your lawn after the winter
  
• Mow the grass as necessary but don’t put the clippings on the compost after applying weed killer
  
• If you used moss killer after a couple of weeks rake out the dead moss and any other debris on the lawn

 
Fruit and Vegetables

• The blossom of peach, nectarine and apricot trees should be protected from frost with a cover of fleece. Remove it in the daytime to allow insects to pollinate
  
• Fans, cordons and espalier fruit trees should now be pruned
  
• Plum and cherry trees can be pruned now the threat of getting silver leaf disease has gone
  
• Begin feeding citrus plants with a special citrus food
  
• Second early potatoes can be planted at the start of the month and maincrop ones at the end of the month and potatoes already planted will not need earthing up
  
• Carry on with successional sowings of salad crops etc so that you do not have a glut of vegetables that cannot be frozen
  
• Thin out seedlings as soon as they are big enough
  
• Plant onion sets, shallot and garlic if not done last month
  
• Buy young plants of herbs and keep them on the kitchen window sill or a cool greenhouse until it is warm enough to plant outside. A few pots of herbs outside the kitchen door is always welcome

 
Wildlife

• Make your wildlife pond more friendly by adding native planting such as marsh marigold as close to the edge as possible and making one end have a very shallow entry into the water so any creatures and climb in and out
  
• Keep feeding the birds but only with small sized food so the mother does not take large pieces back to the fledglings
  
• Hedgehogs will be coming out of hibernation so extra food, other slugs, may be needed by them as all their fat reserves will have been used up over the winter
  
• If you want to attract butterflies put in some butterfly attracting plants such as buddleia, honesty or even nettles

 
Looking Good This Month

Berberis Darwinii  - Spiny shrub with orange flowers followed by black berries
Aubretia - Brightly coloured flowers smothering trailing plant
Bellis Perennis -  Daisy like flowers on early spring bedding
Berberis Darwinii -  Spiny shrub with orange flowers followed by black berries
Convallaria Major - Lily of the Valley with very sweet fragrance
Dicentra Spectabilis - Bleeding heart. Heart shaped flowers on arching stems
Euphorbia Polychroma - Cushion spurge. Very long lasting flower-like yellow bracts
Magnolia Stellata - Tree with white star shaped blooms
Prunus - Many varieties of tree with stunning blossom
Ribes Sanguineum - Flowering currant. Scented flowers from white to dark red

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