Your Garden This Month: March
By this time of the year, I hope you’ve enjoyed some juicy peaches or nectarines. They’ve been heavy this year, so make sure you reward your trees with some nice organic fertiliser and a healthy dose or two of Seasol. This is a great time to feed your fruit trees as they are growing actively, and they will take up nutrients quite rapidly.
Remember to keep the water up to your fruit trees while they’re fattening up your fruit. However, hold the water back from the tree one week before you pick. This will prevent your fruit from being too watery, and will help it keep better.
Lawn beetles are still quite active, and ground temperatures are still high. On hot nights, this means they’re flying around, headed toward your lighting, looking for a nice juicy patch to target. If you’re getting messy dead patches in your growing lawn, you could be under attack from African Lawn beetle.
Keep your watering time above average through early autumn, as March can still be a hot month. Try to aim for a longer run time of watering while doing so less frequently—rather than lots of short-duration watering. This will encourage deeper root growth, and give your lawn or plants a better chance of coping in the heat.
Also avoid watering your lawn in the evenings, as moist warm lawns in the dark of evening can often trigger a fungal attack in summer, especially when we have these hot nights and thunderstorm activity. Ideally water in the early hours of the morning, and allow it to dry out during the day.
The weather has been quite conducive to black spot on roses; keep an eye on them when dead heading. If they are looking off colour, usually a bit yellow with black spots, spray them with sour milk. If you don’t see any recovery you may need to use a fungicide. Just remember to avoid spraying fungicide when bees are foraging. See our article entitled Bees, Bugs & Biodiversity for more information.
Keep an eye on your citrus trees this time of year. Look out for teeth marks on the leaves and white fly when you brush past the leaf. Treat with eco-oil, but make sure the tree is firstly well hydrated. Gaul wasp is out and about, so cut it off and dispose of it in the rubbish bin as soon as you detect it. If your trees are yellowing in the leaf, feed them with some chelated iron by mixing it in a watering can and pouring it over the top of the tree. This allows it to be absorbed through the leaf and the root system. Don’t do it in the heat of the day as it could burn the leaves.
Keep the mulch up to your trees, as March can still be a bit hot. Remember when mulching trees: keep the mulch back off the trunk, or it may cause collar rot on the tree. You can achieve this simply by placing a ring of bricks or pavers around the tree.
Enjoy your garden in March, we will look at the coming autumn jobs next month.
Happy growing!
David
David Allington
David is the owner of Allingtons Lawn & Garden Care. He has been in the horticultural industry for nearly two decades, and has pioneered an exciting gardening services business at the cutting edge of the industry. Through this site, he shares his knowledge and expertise. Return to the home page to view all on offer or drop us a line via the contact form.
