Garden tasks for March
- patrickwiltshire3
- 3 days ago
- 3 min read
We've reached St David's Day - the first of the month and it's an optimistic time to start waking up the growing season. I'm going to be doing just that in the gardens in East Yorkshire. There are three jobs I always look forward to doing this month and it's those I'll highlight here.
1) Cutting back the butterfly bushes
After the long dormant season it's time to prune butterfly bushes to keep them:
looking trim and tidy
promote new healthy growth
at a height proportional to the garden as a whole
Looking trim and tidy
Left to its own devices a butterfly bush, Buddleya davidii, can quickly become a tree out of control and way too big for your garden if it's not pruned on an annual basis. It becomes too congested with too many stems and when over-sized it loses its elegance and beautiful form.
So prune your butterfly bush in early spring and keep it looking neat and tidy. A butterfly bush has so much to offer both us gardeners and pollinating insect if we prune it right and at the right time.
Promote new healthy growth
Flowers grow on new wood on butterfly bushes which is a winning attribute. It means it's forgiving if we prune heavily and actually rewards us with flowers when we encourage the next generation of stems to come along.
New growth is fresh and vigorous. It's healthy and wants to get growing. The new growth is keen to grow and this year's stems have the potential to put on a metre to 150cm worth of growth upon which will burst open the pretty flowerheads.
At a height proportional to the garden as a whole
With secateurs prune the stems of butterfly bushes back to a height knowing that the stems grow to a metre to 150cm. You want a bush to reach 150cm in height for? - perhaps for the middle of the flowerbed? - then cut it back to its base. Want a bush that reaches three metres? - perhaps as a focal point in the garden or to hide an eye-sore in the background? - then cut it back to around 1.5m above ground level.
Tips for pruning butterfly bushes
I recommend using a shredder to chop up the stems you prune. This means you have either an excellent composting ingredient for beautiful compost later down the line or you reduce the volume of green waste to put in your green-waste bin; a good practical consideration for us gardeners.
Prune horizontally to a pair of buds. The buds appear as pairs on this shrub so prune to just above any one of these pairs with a nice, sharp clean cut.
When cutting stems be mindful of hard stems near your eyes. You might even want to wear safety goggles to prevent stems poking you in the eye. Or be at least wary if you don't have eye protection.
2) Cutting back the dogwoods
Now we've enjoyed seeing the bright red, yellow, purple or lime-green stems of dogwoods through the winter it's time to snip them hard back to encourage them to grow their brightly-coloured first year stems again.
With sharp secateurs cut them hard back to about 5-10cm higher then ground level. Use the cuttings in vase displays indoors paired with the stems of pussy willow - that's one suggestion.
Alternatively do as you would with the stems of butterfly bushes - shred or cut them into small pieces and add to the compost heap or green-waste bin for disposal.
3) Lifting and dividing the snowdrops after they flower
Get your border spade and prepare to increase your flower stocks of those hopeful and beautiful snowdrops you enjoyed in late winter and the beginning of March.
After they've flowered dig deep under the tufts of leaves (snowdrop bulbs are more deeply set in the soil than we imagine) and lift up with your spade. The tufts can be separated out into mini- tufts and planted in gaps around the garden.
The good news is that snowdrops grow and flower well in shady parts of the garden too so they nicely furnish a bare spot under a tree or in a north-facing bed.
Doing this gives you more flowers in the garden in a more economical way. There is a more cohesive look to your planting when there are snowdrops in several parts of the garden too.
