This is the month for pruning shrubs and roses, dividing perennials, sowing tender plants and mulching fruit trees. Follow our guide to keep your garden looking its best.
Order bedding plants
Order fuchsias, geraniums, marguerites and other young plug plants from mail-order suppliers. It’s also a good time to order summer-flowering bulbs, such as dahlia, gladioli and eucomis.
Pruning roses
Remove any dead, diseased or damaged stems from roses this month. On bush varieties, cut stems back to an outward-facing bud, shortening them by about a third or half. Watch our video clips of rose pruning to get more tips.
Pruning shrubs
Prune away one or perhaps two flowering shoots from large mahonias each year, after flowering. This will encourage a succession of new replacement shoots to grow up from the base. Old, leggy shoots can be cut right down to ground level or you can stagger the length of stems to create a more interesting shape. The stems of dogwoods, willows, hardy fuchsias and ceratostigma should also be pruned back hard this month to encourage fresh, brightly coloured new growth. Cut down tall stems on Buddleia davidii to emerging shoots lower down the plant, shaping the shrub to control its size.
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