In Your Garden

FEBRUARY

Order your seeds so you can start a few things off early. Don’t get too carried away though – unless you have room to grow tomatoes indoors or in a heated greenhouse, wait until the weather warms up, especially at night, to avoid having plants that need to go outside but it’s still too cold. Also, don’t sow too many – little and often is the best strategy. You can plant shallots and onion sets and in drier areas, sow broad beans direct.

Delay cutting back all your perennials and ornamental grass until the end of this month, as they will continue to provide habitats for wildlife that will still be taking shelter in hollow stems and in the soil, while the lavae of moths are nestled in the leaves and grass cuttings leftover from winter. At the end of February, just before new growth appears, clipped deciduous grasses to within a few centimetres of the ground.

This is a good month to create plant supports using pruned branches. Insert a few upright stems around emerging plants and use long flexible stems to weave in between them. These natural support soon become almost invisible in the summer.

Take root cuttings..... a great way to increase your plant stock. Try it on herbaceous perennials.

Prune bush or shrub roses (not climbers) and wisteria

Prune late summer clematis. Cut it down to the lowest pair of buds. This will produce lots of new vigorous stems with plenty of flowers. If you don’t prune them the plant becomes too woody, with flowers produced too high up. Also winter-prune wisteria in February.

Refresh your winter pots. Look out for spring primroses and flowering bulbs to freshen up your winter containers

Trim winter heathers to just below the flowered stems. Don’t prune too hard though…. because they don’t regenerate from old wood.

Tidy up citrus plants late this month, cut back leggy growth by two thirds. Remove weak or overcrowded stems.

Prune deciduous hedges eg beech and  hornbeam whilst still dormant and before the birds start nesting.

Sow peppers and chilli early because they need a long growing season. Sow in a heated propagator or in trays on a sunny windowsill.

If the soil isn’t waterlogged, now is a good time to move deciduous shrubs. Dig them up with as much root as possible and replant immediately

Now is the time to give garden forks, spades and other tools a really good clean. Sharpen secateurs because you will need them soon; Roses are best pruned in late winter and early spring, just as they are coming into growth. (Never prune the early-flowering Rosa Banksiae).

Clean out bird boxes and feed the birds. February is often the coldest month of the year and food can be in short supply for birds and small mammals