Late Winter Garden Tasks

Late Winter Garden Tasks

When the sun does come out there are still lots to be done in the garden.

Now is the time to take full advantage of the reduced or slowing down of growth in the garden. Putting time aside to tackle the weeds, complete all your winter pruning, spreading mulch are my top tasks that I see as being important so that you will be in the best position for spring. Here is a more comprehensive list of garden tasks for late winter;

  • Weed all garden areas, once weeded apply an organic fertiliser and then spread a thick layer of mulch over beds.
  • Treat your lawn areas with a broad leaf spray to remove the broadleaf weeds before spring – this may need to be reapplied a number of times.
  • Fertiliser your lawns with a high nitrogen content fertiliser. This should have a recommend N:P:K ratio of 4:1:2
  • Complete the pruning of your roses (See full blog post in this newsletter).

  • Cutting back and or dividing of your perennial plants. Now is a really good time to look at your herbaceous perennial plants. Are there any gaps in the bed? Can you divide them to fill in gaps? Is there anything not pulling its weight in its show and growth. I have just cut back and shaped all of our Rosemary, French Lavenders and Salvia “Santa Barbara” here at the Garden at The Berkshires. We removed the dead flowers and about 5 – 10 cm of the foliage on the Lavender and Rosemary.  These have all been roughly shaped to give round cloud like forms. The Salvia have had all of their old/dead flowers cut back to ground level, the new growth is already coming through.
  • Complete pruning on your deciduous trees (as long as they are not the early spring flowering ones)
  • Plant out new garden areas – now is the time I would always recommend to do any new plantings.
  • Check irrigation systems, make sure all systems are working, fix broken drippers, pop ups and joiners. Changing batteries of controllers if necessary. Ensure the systems are ready to go for when the hot weather will hit.
  • If you have any water features or ponds now is a good time to empty out and clean if needed. If you manage to get this done before a shower of rain you could let the rain fill them back up.
  • Fix up or repair any hard landscaping parts of the garden such as paths, wall, gravel or pebble areas.
Glenice Buck
glenice@glenicebuckdesigns.com.au