Garden Tips March April | Hawthorn Nurseries & Landscaping ltd.

Hawthorn’s seasonal reminders. Bi-monthly gardening tips for the months of March and April

Looking good in the garden now

Due to the very cold winter, lawns are looking very scalded and burned. We recommend scarifying and mowing with a bagger. The bag will collect the scarified grass. We recommend an application of 10.10.20. 225g per 10 m2.
If there is a heavy cover of moss, apply a sulphate of iron at 300g per 100m2.
Regular mowing is important from now on.

There is a great deal of frost damage to plants from the severe winter. Frost damage should be pruned off or severely cut back. If the plant is dead to the root, it should be dug out and replaced.
Prepare beds for summer flowers. Dig in FYM and ground seaweed.
Clip winter flowering Heathers before new growth begins.
Plants in pots should be lightly pruned and a well balanced feed applied every six weeks.
As the weather warms up, perennials will start growing. To control slugs, use beer traps, crushed shells or grit. A caution: Slug pellets are effective on slugs, but they may also poison birds that eat the pellets or the slugs.
Hard surfaces will benefit from hand weeding, cleaning with power washers, and the raking of gravel areas to remove debris and moss from the winter.

Recommended bulbs are:

Plant flowering tubers. Dahlias and Begonias for planting out in mid May.
Sow summer bedding now.
Sow tender vegetable seed now and, once germinated, start to liquid feed before planting out in mid May.
Start your herb seeds.

Increase watering intervals.
Liquid feed all indoor plants every six weeks.
If you have indoor fruit trees, water every ten days or until dry. They benefit greatly from being fertilised. The key ingredients are zinc, iron and manganese.
Pot bound plants should be potted on to bigger size pots, with free draining soil mixed with ground seaweed.