Providing this month’s tips is Graham Stewart, Curator of Dawyck Botanic Garden
Garden tips for April GROW FOR
KITCHEN GLORY Carina Contini’s Kitchen Garden Cookbook is a collection of more than 100 seasonal recipes. The book also tells the story of how the Edinburgh restauranteur and her husband restored a large Victorian garden on the outskirts of the city, which now serves their award-winning restaurants. The recipes bring together Contini’s Italian family heritage and her Scottish roots.
Wild about fl owers For the fi rst time in its history, the Heritage
Lottery Fund has awarded a unique partnership of conservation organisations and local councils – led by Plantlife – a signifi cant sum for a national project to save the UK’s remaining fragments of meadow. Wild fl ower meadow planting is enjoying a huge vogue in gardening; they look beautiful and attract wildlife, particularly threatened pollinators. The £3 million project will help prevent meadows from vanishing – and with them native fl owers such as green-winged orchid, oxlip, dyer’s greenweed, and meadow saffron.
www.plantlife.org.uk
With the promise of better weather, give your lawn some well-needed attention. Scarify or rake the surface to remove any dead grass, thatch or moss and aerate using a spiking tool or a garden fork. Invigorate the lawn by applying a high-nitrogen fertiliser that will help boost early growth and improve its appearance and colour. It will also make it more resistant to wear.
Prune early spring-flowering shrubs such as forsythia, as they produce their flowers on the previous year’s growth. Be sure to remove and recycle any clippings so as not to harbour disease.
Carry out some post-winter tidying. Rake gravelled areas; lift any twigs and leaves left over from the winter. Sweep hard surfaces. Removing such detritus will help reduce the occurrence of pests and diseases. Raking will also help distribute any worm casts that have appeared and will level out any areas lifted by severe winter frosts.
With the passing of winter frosts, now is the time to plant annual seeds of asters, cosmos, marigold and zinnia to give a colourful spectacle later. Summer flowering bulbs such as gladioli, dahlias and lilies should also be planted, giving a generous handful of manure or leaf mould in the planting soil.
Daffodils or other spring-fl owering bulbs should be left until the foliage goes brown and crisp to ensure bulbs have a chance to produce and store enough food and energy for next year. A high-nitrogen feed may be worth considering too, as this gives an additional boost to the bulbs before dormancy. Scatter on fertiliser, preferably before a shower of rain as this will wash the fertiliser into the soil.
Dig over plant borders, removing weeds and winter debris. Incorporate organic
DAWYCK BOTANIC GARDEN, STOBO, PEEBLES, SCOTTISH BORDERS TEL: 01721 760254
WWW.RBGE.ORG.UK
WWW.SCOTTISHFIELD.CO.UK 113
matter such as manure or leaf mould, this will feed plants, allow air and water to penetrate the soil, stimulating growth and ensuring good flowering.
Plants in tubs can be re-potted if required, given a balanced feed and moved back outdoors; taking care to ensure protection from any late spring frosts that may well catch you unaware, we may not be out of the woods yet.
In the greenhouse, sow vegetable seeds and bring them with a view to hardening them off gradually until planting out towards the beginning of June.
Sow potatoes, either in your vegetable plot or in a suitable container. A dustbin or compost bag works wonders but be sure they have holes in them, otherwise the seed potatoes will rot.
Start weeding early and it will pay dividends later. Consider using mulch over areas of bare soil to act as a weed suppressant and also to act as a slow release fertiliser. It will save you time in the long run.
Sheds and summerhouses will benefi t from being opened up on warm sunny days, allowing good air movement and helping dry out any remaining dampness from the winter. Carefully scrutinise roofi ng felt too, as this time of year might be the best opportunity to replace. A good coat of wood preservative will keep structures looking their best for years to come.
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