Most avid gardeners will tell you that starting as early as possible when getting your garden ready for the warmer weather is a smart idea. This is predominantly due to the fact that there is a surprising amount of work to be done once you assess the situation, and doing this work in the warm sun is going to be relatively draining compared to doing these tasks in the cooler weather. Of course, certain tasks must be done later in the year, such as planting certain crops or flowers, but if you prepare certain things in your garden early, all other tasks will be much more manageable. To help, we’ve listed a number of tasks you can work on over the winter and early springtime so that you can enjoy your garden once the nice weather starts. Also, you can prefer climbing frames that make your kids active and fit.
Transform your garden into a vibrant oasis of color and tranquility with these six essential tips to get your garden summer-ready.
Tidy Your Flower Beds
You can prepare your outdoor kitchen in the summer for perfect cooking and enjoy the fresh breeze air of the flowers in your garden. This can require a lot of time and effort, so it’s worth doing well in advance. You’ll want to spend time pulling up any dead plants, cleaning brickwork or whatever materials you’ve used to create the edge of the flower beds, and collecting any debris that may have found its way into the area. At this point, you can start cultivating your soil as well, turning it over with a garden fork or cultivator ready for planting. Otherwise, the ground can get hard, restricting root growth and reducing access to nutrients and water for your plants.
Keep Weeds At Bay
Unfortunately, pulling up weeds is not a one-off task every year. You’re going to have to do this regularly, and if you leave it too late, you’re going to get overwhelmed by the number of weeds cropping up in your garden. This is why it’s important to get a head start on weeding and keep up with it so that it doesn’t become a large task. Weeds are simply plants that are growing where you don’t want them, yet there are a few common weeds that will grow across the UK due to their ability to disperse their seeds far and wide and in great abundance. You may find weeds in your garden, including chickweed, couch grass, prickly milk thistle and the easily identifiable dandelion. There are also a number of very problematic weeds that grow in the UK, such as Japanese knotweed, which can destroy building foundations, and the Himalayan balsam, which will grow at an alarming rate, suffocating all other plant life. These last two plants should be dealt with quickly, but things like knotweed should be removed by professionals to ensure it is dealt with effectively.
Prune Your Bushes
Certain plants and bushes are going to withstand the winter months, lying dormant to the point of looking as though they’ve died, only to flourish again in the spring. For them to grow back healthily, you’ll want to consider pruning any dead leaves and excessive branches so that they can focus their energy on new growth. Pruning your bushes should be done carefully, and you should focus on removing dead flowers, dead wood, and any scraggly pieces of the bush that have caused the bush to lose its shape. Cut them back right down to the healthy-looking buds that are facing outwards from the plant, and ensure that you cut at a 45° angle with a clean and sharp cutting tool. The angle is important here, as pruning at an angle that is greater than 45° will leave the stem with a surface area that is too large. The larger the surface area of the cut, the longer it will take to heal and begin new growth.
Develop New Areas
Just before spring rolls in may be one of the best times for you to start working on creating new areas within your garden. Most notably is going to be your seating areas or other outdoor gathering spaces. You can add many different things to your garden, whether it’s a cosy hangout space, an outdoor kitchen area, or even an outdoor workout area. There are a few different things to consider for an outdoor area like this, but one thing that is going to benefit most of these spaces is some form of shelter. There are a few different things that will work as a good quality shelter, including awnings and verandas. Awnings can be both freestanding and attached to the side of your home, providing a specific space with some protection from the elements, including the sun, whereas verandas are a fixed addition to the side of your home and tend to be made from solid materials rather than fabric like an awning would be. You can find a great range of different awnings and verandas at Nationwide Home Innovations. Adding something like this to your garden is worth doing early so that you can benefit from them as soon as the weather gets warmer. Also, you can prefer Sheds Liverpool that makes your garden more attractive.
Get Planting Early
There are certain plants and flowers that are able to be grown early, ready for the year ahead. This could be crops, bulbs, and shrubs, and it’s important to find the right ones to grow at the correct time of the year. For example, in January, you could start planting chilli plants, basil, and aubergines indoors and keep them on a heated propagator, ready to transfer them to your garden later on in the year. During this month, you can also start sowing geranium and coleus seeds, keeping them warm in the same heated propagator as your crops, but you can also start growing a few different flowers outside, too, in an unheated greenhouse. This can include flowers such as Icelandic poppies and sweet peas. Many people assume that the winter is a time for no growth and barren flowerbeds, but there are a surprising number of things you can start planting early, ready to flower and flourish in the spring and summer.
Start A Compost Bin
It’s important for your plants to receive plenty of nutrients to help them grow and stay healthy. A poor-quality soil is going to hinder their ability to thrive, so it’s a good idea to ensure that you are consistently replenishing these nutrients across your flowerbeds and borders. You can do this using nutrient-rich compost, and you can even start making your own. Purchase or build a compost bin so that you can start adding food waste and other compostable items to it, which will break down over time. You can add many things to your compost bin, but you should remember that whatever you add will change the composition of the compost, and this composition may not be ideal for certain plants. For example, you might add lots of acidic food waste, which will be great for plants like ferns, heathers, magnolia, and hydrangeas, whereas certain other plants will prefer a neutral soil like roses, and some will prefer a more alkaline soil such as dianthus, lavender, and geraniums. Take this into account when filling your compost bins so that you can create the best compost for your plants. You can also speed up the process by adding nematode worms, too.
