Spring gardening tips

With warmer weather on the horizon and wildlife waking, it is vital to prepare your garden for the spring to give you a more productive year of colour and produce.

There are some basic spring gardening tips to follow, which will help to ensure that you maximise your chances of a beautiful garden.

• Good Soil: A plant relies on the soil for its essential source of moisture, air and nutrients. Many small beneficial creatures such as earthworms, wood lice, centipedes and microscopic bacteria contribute to a healthy ecosystem by converting dead material into organic matter. By adding fertiliser and compost to it, you will be giving it a welcome feed prior to putting it to the test when growing plants.
• Compost Bin: If you haven’t created a compost area to dispose of your garden waste material, do so as this will supply you with rich, fertile compost for your garden as the year goes on and will help to give you good soil. Ideally, you should have a good mixture of grass clippings, vegetable peelings, paper and woody prunings. To help the process along you’ll need to turn your compost with a garden fork each month to keep it aerated and think about lining it with chicken wire to prevent animals from disturbing it.
• Flower beds and borders: Much like you give your home a spring clean, now is the time to tidy your borders and remove dead leaves and waste from lawns and ponds. Then set about cutting back the old dead growth of grasses and herbaceous perennials. Now is the time to dig a 5cm layer of compost into the borders to help give it nutrients.
• Move deciduous shrubs: Now is the ideal time to move deciduous shrubs that may benefit from a better location as they will be more likely to be dormant. Just avoid the roots drying out when moving them.
• Sow seeds: This is an especially good time to sow seeds that may require a longer growing season such as geraniums, begonias and others in a heat propagator.
• Pruning: Don’t forget to prune winter flowering shrubs, Wisteria, summer-flowering Clematis and winter-flowering Jasmine for example.
• Water Butts: Install water butts now ready for the summer. Rainwater is particularly useful for watering for acid-loving plants (tap water is often slightly alkaline).
• Fencing & Trellis: Set about fixing fencing and trellis around the garden now, prior to plants being in the full glory. Don’t forget to treat them with a wood preservative to prolong their life.

Preparing your garden now will not only help to ensure you have a flourishing show later in the year, but will make spring a little less hectic. MOLLY MAID, the professional house cleaning experts, hope that these simple spring gardening tips will help to keep your on top of your garden duties. Good luck.

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