There are some people who feel that their garden merely needs work during the late winter and early spring, or that it cannot shine year round. This could not be further from the truth, as with a little bit of planning and some of these helpful tips you can have 365 days of beautiful and seasonal plants to enjoy.
Winter
This is perhaps the season that gives some of us gardeners the most trouble. Because of the cold temperatures, we often just hunker down and prepare for the worst, thinking that there is nothing that can be done and that the weather just has to be waited out. While doing the bare minimum during the winter will indeed protect your garden and make it ready for flourishing in the spring, there’s much more you can do to keep it looking great and even adding some festive touches to help you with outdoor entertaining or similar pursuits.
Here are a few tips to keep your garden looking great during the colder months.
- Shrubs are often best because they are more often than not quite resistant to even hard frosts and freezes. Not to mention the fact that some like the Winterberry give a garden a wonderful seasonal appearance that will be greatly enhanced by the appearance of frost on the branches or snow on the ground.
- Tailor your entire landscape to the cold weather. This might be easier said than done for some amateur gardeners, but it’s important to make your winter garden smaller, or at least landscape for the appearance of a smaller space. This will make it feel more cozy and secluded during the winter, particularly if there is a tendency in your area for large snowfalls.
- Be sure to protect your more vulnerable plants such as flowers and vegetables from the frost so that they are ready to bloom come spring. The best way to do this is to purchase weather proof coverings that can go over your plants during the winter, or at least whenever the temperatures dip below freezing for an extended period of time. You will also want to consider using some pre emergent weed killer to treat the soil at this time, in order to prevent any weeds from coming out when spring arrives.
Spring
This is definitely the season when you will want your garden to be at its very best. Virtually all of the flowers and other ornamentals that make a garden truly beautiful are at their best in spring. The first thing you should do is to make sure that your plants have survived the winter healthy. Once the weather starts warming up, here are a few things you can do that will make you the envy of everyone in the neighbourhood.
- The soil is obviously the most important factor in the health and appearance of your garden, and due to this, you should make sure to check the ph level in the soil before doing anything else to prepare for spring. The ph is perhaps the best indicator of how well your plants will fare when they do bloom, and checking it is actually pretty easy. There are many home kits available to check the level of acidity, and enriching the soil if need be is a quick and easy process as well.
- Pruning the trees and shrubs that kept your garden going during the winter is an important part of springtime maintenance. This will keep them healthy throughout the summer, and will also make the garden look much more tended to when it doesn’t have that covering layer of snow.
- You’ll also want to start thinking about pest control during this time. The cold temperatures of winter are usually a great protection against the pests that can invade and cause damage your, but as those fade and the weather warms up you need to be prepared. The best thing you can do is to research some of the natural and organic pest control methods that will kill bugs but leave plants, pets, and people unharmed.
Summer
A garden during the summer should be the focal point for your outdoor entertaining, and there are few things more pleasant than spending warm summer evenings grilling out amongst the plants you’ve worked so hard to cultivate and nurture. These tips will make sure that you have the best garden in the neighborhood during the hot summer months.
- Continue your pruning efforts, especially for azaleas, rhododendrons and similar bushes. You will want to have this done in early to mid-summer, as this will prepare these bushes and shrubs quite well for the next spring.
- Some people might think that it being summer means that it is too late to plant anything and that if it isn’t in the ground by spring it won’t be blooming before autumn or winter. This actually couldn’t be further from the truth, as there are several plants such as sunflowers and nasturtiums that bloom quickly and add quite a bit of color. These can be planted as late as June or July and still bloom before the summer wanes.
- Landscaping can be just as important in the summer as it was in the winter. You will want to do the opposite however and attempt to make the area larger and more welcoming, as opposed to cozy. This can easily be accomplished by moving garden furniture further out, and creating a large open space as a centerpiece, bordered by the bushes and shrubs that you used to enclose the area during the winter. Placing a grill or other cooking apparatus outside should be done with care, as it has the potential to disrupt the aesthetic of the area, however it can greatly enhance the enjoyment of being outside and is a great use for any vegetables you might have grown during the spring.
Autumn
Autumn is a great time to both get your garden ready for winter, and to add some color to it to go along with all of the celebrations that take place at this time of year. A good portion of your autumn gardening should be dedicated to harvesting whatever vegetables you have nurtured over the summer, as they should be ready to be picked a bit before the first frost.
- It may not seem like it, but there are actually many flowers that can add some color to your autumnal garden. One of the best of these is the Marguerite daisy, which is a very hardy flower and will continue to bloom right up until the first hard freeze of the winter. If you live in a more temperate climate, these can be a good long term solution to a garden that doesn’t have enough color in it.
- There are always some seasonal plants that you might consider adding in the autumn, among them are squash and other vegetables that go well with the gastronomic delights of the season, in addition to pumpkins and other gourds. Although if you decide to grow pumpkins you will want to make sure that you have enough spare room to plant them, as they tend to take up a fair amount of space.
- Perennials such as Branched Bugbane are also a great addition in the autumn, as they tend to bloom right at the end of summer and can be a great lead in to your late autumn plants and give a good buffer between the summer and autumn seasons.
Keeping all of these tips in mind will ensure that you have the absolute best garden possible, no matter what the season or the weather.
