Monthly Garden To Do's
January
- Inspect stored bulbs and discard the bad ones
- Clean and sharpen garden tools
- Plan gardens for this year
- Try forcing some spring-flowering bulbs
- Order seeds
- Start geraniums and begonia seeds
- Inspect and treat house plants for white fly, spider mites, and aphids
February
- Plant your geranium seed indoors
- Take stem cuttings of your geraniums and fuchsias
- Plant impatiens, peppers, egg plants indoors
- Prune shade and fruit trees except maple and birch
- Visit your local greenhouse
March
- Start your tomatoes indoors (late March early April)
- Order summer-flowering bulbs
- Cut down ornamental grasses
- Prune summer-flowering shrubs (eg Hydrangea)
- Plant flower & vegetable seeds indoors
- Prune fruit trees & grape vines
- Start summer flowers and tender perennials (tuberous begonias, canas, calas and caladiums in pots)
- Apply dormant spray (non-freezing temperatures, before buds open)
- Loosen packed mulch and press back frost heaved perennials
- Check and repair garden tools
- Cut some spring flowering shrub branches for forcing inside
April
- Prepare annual beds and add compost to perennial borders
- Remove rose protection and move dormant shrubs
- Plant cold weather vegetable seeds in the garden
- Repair lawn with compost, seed, rake & fertilize (late April early May)
- Plant shrubs, trees, hedges
- Remove rose mulch a little at a time, prune
- Plant early vegetables (peas, onions, radish, beets)
- Treat birches against leaf miner
- Plant larkspur and calendulas outdoors
- Check out garden shows
- Cut lawn only if necessary
- Open pond
- Begin to move ornamental grasses and perennials
May
- Harden off your seedlings
- Treat for slugs, aphids, and Blackspot if necessary
- Deadhead tulips and daffodils, leaving the foliage to die back naturally
- Plant trees and shrubs
- Plant tender summer-flowering bulbs (glads, canas, dahlias)
- Transfer bedding annuals to outdoor cold frame to harden
- Check trees for tent caterpillars & other insects
- Prune shrubs & trees after flowering - stake and tie as required
- Find average last date for frost and add two weeks to transplant tender flowers (petunias etc.)
- Begin to remove weeds
- Take notes and photos of bulb plantings for later changes
- Deadhead faded tulips and daffodils (leave foliage to feed the bulb)
- Weed gardens, and apply mulch
- Cage peonies
June
- Plant annuals and tender perennials
- Thin vegetable seedlings and weed
- Deadhead flowers after blooming
- Pinch back mums, snapdragons, asters, dahlia and other late bloomers
- Prune evergreens & hedges if necessary
- Use grass clippings & compost on garden to conserve moisture & control weeds
- Thin out crowded vegetables & annuals
- Irrigate lawns & gardens as required
- Stake/cage dahlias, tomatoes, gladiolas
- Seed directly fast growers such as calendula, cosmos, lavatera, marigolds
- Prepare cuttings of shrubs for propagation
- Prune shrubs and trees after flowering
- Seed flowering kale outdoors
- Weed and water as necessary
July
- Prune spring-flowering shrubs after they are finished blooming
- Stake plants that tend to fall over (Delphiniums, Euphorbia, tall Sedums) and pinch back as necessary
- Fertilize vegetables and annuals
- Raise cutting height of mower blade
- Pinch back annuals to make bushier
- Cut out raspberry canes & narrow rows to 40 cm
- Mow lawn, weed, water as necessary
- Trim back strawberry plants after fruiting
- Transplant kale
- Turn compost
- Deadhead and trim perennials as necessary
August
- Plant fall vegetable seeds
- Order spring-flowering bulbs
- Trim and divide irises
- Make a garden structure
- Divide and move peonies and oriental poppies
- Prune climbing roses
- Order flowering bulbs for fall (try colchicum for next fall)
- Spray shrubs & perennials for powdery mildew control
- Water and weed as necessary
- Plant fall-flowering perennials
- Dry flowers and herbs
September
- Trim and divide perennials
- Prepare and seed new lawns
- Plant evergreens
- Plant spring-flowering bulbs
- Prepare & seed new lawns
- Plant shrubs & evergreens
- Renovate perennial border
- Take cuttings from geraniums & coleus
- Bring in houseplants before its too cold
- Fertilize and aerate lawns as required
- Water well all evergreens
October
- Dig, dry and store summer-flowering bulbs
- Rake leaves from lawn
- Prepare and dig new garden beds
- Put ponds to bed
- Cut off dead foliage
- Plant spring flowering bulbs (tulips, daffodils, crocus)
- Dig and store dahlias, gladiolus, tuberous begonias, canas
- Plant amaryllis for Christmas bloom
- Remove and distribute almost finished compost and gather leaves and add to compost pile
- Seed new lawns
November
- Fertilize lawn
- Make sure evergreens are well watered for winter
- Protect young trees from rodents
- Plant some spring bulbs for forcing
December
- Watch for bugs on houseplants (white flies, spider mites, and aphids)
- Protect your rose bushes
- Apply mulch
- Cut branches for winter decorations
- Order seed catalogues