Gardening Hints & Tips – March & April 2025

February 27, 2025| Current Issue, Gardening Hints & Tips

March & April 2025

Worplesdon Garden Club is a friendly and enthusiastic club which meets every second Tuesday of the month from 8-10pm in the Old Church, Emmanuel Parish Centre, Stoughton, Guildford, GU2 9SJ with doors open from 7.45pm.

For more information on Worplesdon Garden Club contact Tim Bonnert on 01483 237702

About Worplesdon Garden Club

Membership is only £15 for the year from January (£8 from July) and includes a full schedule of speakers throughout the year, plus a range of social events including Garden Visits, Lunches, Barbecues, and Horticultural Shows. Please see the club website, www.worplesdongardenclub.co.uk, for more details. Visitors (£3) and new members are always welcome.

For more information on Worplesdon Garden Club contact Tim Bonnert on 01483 237702, info@worplesdongardenclub.co.uk, or visit www.worplesdongardenclub.co.uk where you can read our latest Club Newsletter – www.worplesdongardenclub.co.uk/newsletters

Club News:

Tuesday 11th March
Club Meeting in March:
Peter Smith – ‘The Secret World of Moths’.

Tuesday 8th April
Club Meeting in April:
Viki Webster – ‘Space4Nature’.

Gardening hints and tips for January & February

Hardy annuals can be sown outside where they are to flower, or you can sow in trays undercover or in a sheltered spot.
Sow vegetables that require a long growing season, such as Chillis, in a propagator or on a warm window sill.
Finish cutting back all dead tops of perennials to make way for the new growth.
Bush roses should be pruned now; typically reducing stems by about one-third to one-half.
Shrubs grown for winter colour of their stems such as Dogwood (Cornus) should be cut back (stooled) now.
Fill in any depressions in the grass and over-sow any bare patches with new seed.
Mow lawns when necessary, but raise the cutter height so as not to remove too much of the grass blade for the first few cuts. Dedicated moss treatments or combination treatments of moss and spring ‘weed and feed’ can be applied towards the end of the March and through April. However, do not compost any grass cuttings from treated grass for at least the next 3 mowings.
Divide congested perennials – wait until the first signs of growth then lift and split, discarding the dead or woody centre of the clump and replant the younger vigorous parts from around the edges.
If you have any indoor bulbs (hyacinth, amaryllis, narcissi) that have finished flowering, move these to a very sheltered outdoor area or ideally a cold frame or unheated greenhouse and continue to water and feed until the leaves die down naturally in a few months’ time.
The foliage of outdoor spring bulbs should also be left to die down naturally – don’t be tempted to cut or tie. Watering them with a high potassium liquid fertiliser such as a liquid tomato feed will encourage the best flowers next year.
Ventilate greenhouses on warmer or sunnier days if you are overwintering plants or perhaps give it a Spring clean inside and out and ensure that the glass is clean to allow as much light in as possible.
If April frosts are forecast, protect tender new growth by covering with newspaper or horticultural fleece at night.
Water plants and seedlings grown in the greenhouse regularly as warm days and rapidly growing plants will dry the compost out quickly.
In the vegetable garden, it’s time to direct-sow carrots, parsnips, radishes and beets as the soil begins to warm.
Chitted seed potatoes should be planted from late March through April, especially first-early potatoes that will be ready to harvest in about 12 weeks. The old canes from autumn fruiting Raspberries should be cut back to ground level, but do not cut the canes from the earlier, summer-fruiting varieties.
Start the biological control of Vine Weevil larvae with the application of a nematode soil drench, and treat for Box Tree Moth caterpillars with a bacterial wash.
Continue to sow annuals and vegetable seeds and prick out and pot on any seedlings as they grow.