What are you doing in your garden now?

[Appuskidu]

I’ve been out this weekend and tidied things up a bit-mowed the lawn, raked some leaves, but I was just wondering what else I should be doing! When are you starting to plant things?

We’ve had a busy weekend taking a rotted shed down and cutting lots of stuff right back.

This is the first year of living in our house that I’ve had the time to take an interest in the garden, I feel like I need some kind of calendar or list each month of what I should be doing!

Pulling out all the dead stuff from winter.
Pruning and cutting back
Cleaning out the (tiny) pond of slime weed
Burning all said dead stuff (I smell like an Arbroath smokie!)
Raking the grass - too wet to cut
Weeding
Finding where the paths begin and end and cutting back encroaching beds.
Maybe start sowing some seeds indoors.
Cleaning all the water bowls and mini ponds and filling with fresh water

DD painted 3 bird boxes. Put them up last weekend and a Robin has moved in one.

Dug up shrubs I don't want. Moved a few. Cut back climbers. I'm being ruthless this year to make it more cohesive.

Raked leaves etc

I have been pruning a few things and digging my veg beds, picked up loads of pony poo to go in on my beds, cut back the jasmine which has taken over the garden over the past few years and cut the buddlia.

Being cold mainly. Thus weekend I have pruned down my buddleias, removed a knackered plastic greenhouse and cleared more space to put a new, bigger one in in a couple of weeks. Rescued a couple of tiny foxgloves that were languishing and potted them up. Indoors, I have sown tomatoes, chillies and cucumbers.

I bought the RHS gardening month by month book on Friday and it's brilliant. It has a quick list of jobs to do each month followed by a chapter explaining tasks in depth. Lots of advice for growing from seed, repotting, pruning, growing fruit and veg. I also like the photos of plants that are at their best each month and plan to use that to make a real plan for the garden. At the moment, my gardening is very haphazard with random bulbs and no real structure. It's accessible enough for beginner but I could see myself referring back to it for years, even when I have more experience.

@MilduraS

I bought the RHS gardening month by month book on Friday and it's brilliant. It has a quick list of jobs to do each month followed by a chapter explaining tasks in depth. Lots of advice for growing from seed, repotting, pruning, growing fruit and veg. I also like the photos of plants that are at their best each month and plan to use that to make a real plan for the garden. At the moment, my gardening is very haphazard with random bulbs and no real structure. It's accessible enough for beginner but I could see myself referring back to it for years, even when I have more experience.

That book sounds good-am off to search for it!

Thank you, all-I’m making a list of things to do!

@MilduraS

I bought the RHS gardening month by month book on Friday and it's brilliant. It has a quick list of jobs to do each month followed by a chapter explaining tasks in depth. Lots of advice for growing from seed, repotting, pruning, growing fruit and veg. I also like the photos of plants that are at their best each month and plan to use that to make a real plan for the garden. At the moment, my gardening is very haphazard with random bulbs and no real structure. It's accessible enough for beginner but I could see myself referring back to it for years, even when I have more experience.

I bought this last week!

Just started today, got a few varieties of sunflower and some mixed butterfly diversity packets planted and left snug on out south facing living room window sill. Not warm enough here for them to go outside yet.

We saved some geraniums and got rid of a shed load of weeds. Phew.

This weekend I have divided and moved some plants, raked the soil conditioner I had applied to my raised beds 3 weeks ago in to mix it with the proper soil beneath ready for sowing, planted a row of self set onions (teeny tiny currently), planted bare root strawberries that arrived on Friday, sown some lettuce and nasturtium seeds, and laid my summer deep hoses.
This evening I will be setting pea seeds onto some damp kitchen towel to presprout them prior to sowing out - to foil the mice.

I've spent this weekend weeding the flower borders, digging compost out of the bottom of the heaps and mulching around the bulbs and the pulmonaria which is in flower.

It looks lovely and clean but my back aches big time

Reading with interest! I'm loving getting out in the garden at the moment. We are planning a refurb - new decking to cover a very old patio and clearing a patch of very overgrown shrubbery to make it more manageable and useable. Been raking up leaves and clearing weeds/dead plants this weekend. Looking at the lawn and wondering if it's time to cut it yet.

Im a gardener. Never stopped planting this year except for the 2 weeks it was frozen. Wack them in! Saves on the watering.

I am weeding, cutting back, & laying mulch mainly.

Clearing! Take out a small spindly apple tree and a an equally spindly holly bush. Cleared some ivy from walls and have filled 12 garden waste sacks!
Next tasks are to remove some variegated shrub thing, clear a load of ivy from the ground and to try and improve the soil before laying out some new beds and lay a new path. I can't wait to transform it but may have overestimated my capabilities 🤣

Cutting back spindly stuff, edging, first mow, erm staring everywhere and not knowing what to do ...

Keep notes for where I want more spring bulbs next year.

My garden is 5 years old and I just planted too many types of plants. I want a more modern planted look. I have gone from liking cottage garden to formal.

Keep notes for where I want more spring bulbs next year

That is a really good idea. I might do a drawing of the garden tomorrow and mark out what’s where!

This weekend we have started the general clear up, put up the temporary green house, planted a few seeds and cleared them a sunny spot on a window sill indoors, dug some compost into the veg patches (needed to move the compost bin so had to empty a fair bit out first), installed an extra water butt, washed down all of the DCs' outdoor toys and listed for sale any they have now outgrown. Over the coming week I will finish tidying up the beds and click and collect a few new garden toys.
Next weekend will be spent planting a few more seeds and sorting out the gravelled paths around the veg patches. DCs have spent the winter making mud pies, and it has left the paths in a mess. I'm really hoping that mowing will be possible too, as the lawn is looking scraggy and uneven but it's still a bit too boggy at the moment.

I accidentally went to the garden centre when I was meant to go to the supermarket, so I have been planting the things I accidentally bought to hide the evidence.

Also moving crocuses from a lawn we are digging up, weeding, and general snipping of hedges.

@MrsBertBibby

I accidentally went to the garden centre when I was meant to go to the supermarket, so I have been planting the things I accidentally bought to hide the evidence.

Also moving crocuses from a lawn we are digging up, weeding, and general snipping of hedges.

I love this! I might accidentally go to the garden centre tomorrow morning!

What did you buy?!

Digging out 3 billion bastarding Spanish bluebells.

We power washed the patio this weekend and cut the grass, we also moved all the small pots so we can prepare them for new flowering plants in a few weeks and repotted six very large ones which had out grown their large pots into thr borders. We also turned the compost heaps, and some other general maintenance.

Just power washing the patios and cutting the grass makes a huge difference.

What did you buy?

I got some snakeshead fritillaries, a rather lovely red anemone, a pretty scarlet and white saxifrage, and an evergreen clematis.

Some of my seedlings are off the mark - tomatoes, cucumbers, strawberries and peppers. Potatoes are chitting on windowsill. I’ve tidied up the poly tunnel, tidied all the veg beds, dug a new veg bed and mown the orchard. Love this time of year, getting everything ready to go and doing all the little jobs that will make everything else easier. I made some big mistakes last year that made gardening quite difficult especially in the baking hot spring we had, so hoping not to redo them (although I’m sure I’ll make a whole load of new ones!).

Tidied the shed, washed the garden toys, pumped up the netball and picked up some rogue cat shit lol

Hoping to sort some planters next for spring and probably gravel the area my daughter plays in as it's ruined!