Beaver Valley Probus Club

Things to do in your garden each month taken from the Ontario Master Gardener Calendar by John Hethrington, Past President, Master Gardeners of Ontario. For more information please contact John.

Please Note: The Paul Zammit presentation on Perennials has been postponed until Thursday, May 28 2020 at the Beaver Valley Community Centre at 7 PM. See you there!

April 2020

• Make sure you have done everything you were supposed to do on the March Master Gardener's List.
• Do stretch and bend exercises before you start in the garden. I find skiing muscles have nothing to do with gardening muscles. Take it easy. There are a lot of gardening days before the ski season comes again.
• I hope you had a chance to spread 19-19-19 general purpose fertilizer over the snow on all your flower beds and shrub borders before the snow disappeared. It melts down into the ground as the snow goes away. It and other fertilizers are available at the Co-Op in Markdale, at 10% discount for 599 Members. If you missed this step this year, plan for next winter and buy the fertilizer this fall.
• The snow has gone but may be back once or twice in April. You can still spread the triple 19 as long as it does not get on to the emerging plants, as it may burn them.
• Organize your compost pile for the new season. Start a new one with the top foot of compost from last year’s pile as a base.
• As the weather warms and the ground dries, prune back perennials and ornamental grasses to 1” to 3” from the ground. Put dead material on your new compost pile. Shred if possible.
• Prepare garden beds for planting. Dig in compost, and/or manure, and/or other organic material around each plant. Remove any weeds that have come through from last fall. When you have cleaned up the beds, ADD 3”TO 4” OF MULCH to control weeds this summer.
• Remove rose protection. For Hybrid Teas, Prune to 6” or 8”and apply dormant oil spray before the buds break.
• Apply dormant oil spray to shrubs like euonymus that may have suffered from scale last year. Do it before the buds break.
• Prepare your vegetable garden with a good digging and mid-month plant the seeds of cool-weather vegetables like peas, spinach, lettuce, onions, beets and seeds of frost resistant annuals like larkspur, sweet peas and calendulas.
• When dry, rake your lawn vigorously to remove thatch, repair damage with weed-free topsoil. Add grass seed to bare spots. Keep moist.
• Fertilize your lawn with slow-release high nitrogen (the first of the 3 numbers) fertilizer. Slow release urea costs more, but it’s worth it.
• Apply crabgrass pre-emergence herbicide to your lawn, if required.
• When spring finally comes, plant trees, shrubs, perennials and biennials in your garden. No need to wait until May 24^th for perennials, that’s for annuals. It may be the first week in June before you can get frost tender annuals into the ground.
• Re-fill your pots and planters with compost. Put empty plastic bottles with tops at the bottom of large pots. You will need less soil and they will be lighter to move. Add slow release plant food to the top 4 inches.
• Plant frost-resistant pansies NOW for a little spring colour.

Things to do in your garden each month taken from the Ontario Master Gardener Calendar by John Hethrington, Past President, Master Gardeners of Ontario. 

March 2020:

• Start tuberous begonias and caladiums and bring them back to life in pots using damp peat moss. 
• Start brassicas (cabbage family) and hardy annual seeds for April-May planting in your garden. 
• Start tomatoes, lettuce and other fast-growing seeds late March, or early April this year. 
• Order summer flowering bulbs. Try www.botanus.com for interesting high-quality bulbs. 
• Get your “To-Do” list for this spring and summer into your computer so you can’t say you lost it. 
• Spread triple 19 fertilizer on the snow on your flower beds and shrub borders before it goes. It’s available at the Markdale Co-Op on Hwy 10 south of Markdale. Ask for our 599 10% discount from the regular price. Call 1-519-986-2031. 
• Check and repair gardening tools. Find them first. Sharpen spades, shovels, etc. Wipe down wooden handles with boiled linseed oil. Paint the handles of small hand tools like trowels with red or yellow fluorescent enamel, so you won’t lose them so often. 
• Apply combination dormant spray to fruit trees and pest-prone shrubs when non-freezing weather permits. Especially good against scale. 
• Start forcing branches of spring-flowering shrubs like Forsythia, and lily-of-the-valley root pips after buds start to swell, later in the month. 
• Prune summer-flowering shrubs and vines when the snow has disappeared. 
• When the snow has gone, and the frost disappears, loosen up packed winter mulch and push perennials back into the soil that have been heaved out of place by the frost. 
• Plan to add a few native berry plants and shrubs that will attract the birds this summer. 
• Visit local nursery greenhouses to smell the coming spring. 
• Check dates for annual garden shows like Canada Blooms, Mar 13 - 22 2020, co-locating with the National Home Show at the Enercare Centre in the CNE grounds. Tickets Reg. $20, Seniors $17, Early Bird on-line to Mar 7, Regular $17, Sr only $14 www.candablooms.com. 
• REMEMBER 
• • Paul Zammit is coming back to the Community Centre in Thornbury for our April Meeting, Thursday April 9 @ 7 pm to talk about perennials. It’s a joint 599 Garden Club /Probus Club presentation. Guests welcome for $10. Get tickets at the March Meeting.

Things to do in your garden each month taken from the Ontario Master Gardener Calendar by  John Hethrington, Past President, Master Gardeners of Ontario. For more information, or your copy of the 11” x 17” calendar of the full year’s tips, please contact John..

February 2020:

• With one January freeze/thaw already this winter, mound up all the available snow and any new snow that falls, around tender plants like roses. If you have a few bows from your Christmas tree, put them over tender plants to catch the snow. It is the freeze/thaw that kills plants, not just the cold.
• Start planning your garden projects for 2019. Make a list, so you will know what you did not get done when you look at it in June. I have mine done and I am tired already. A garden is never finished!
• Start propagating stem cuttings of geraniums, fuchsias, etc. by the end of the month.
• Plant slow germinating seeds inside, like impatiens, peppers, eggplants, etc.
• As the weather warms, start pruning shade trees, fruit trees and shrubs, if you can get to them through the snow. Leave trees that “bleed” like maples and birch until after they have leaves.
• Visit local nursery greenhouses to smell the coming spring. Stop by the Garden Gallery just west of Barrie on Hwy 91 on the way to Angus, and inhale.
• Check the dates for annual garden shows like Canada Blooms: Mar 13 - 27 at the Enercare Centre at the CNE. Early Bird Tickets $17, $14 for Seniors. Go to www.canadablooms.com.
• Pat Brookings, owner of Annan Way Nurseries, is again running a bus tour to Canada Blooms, Wednesday March 18, $98 including Bus, Blooms Entrance & Mandarin Dinner on the way home. Pick-ups at Owen Sound, Chatsworth, Markdale & Flesherton. More Info call Pat 519-376-9444.
• Paul Zammit is coming back to Thornbury, Thursday April 9 at 7 pm to talk about perennials at a joint 599 Garden Club /Probus Club presentation. 

Things to do in your garden each month taken from the Ontario Master Gardener Calendar by John Hethrington, Past President, Master Gardeners of Ontario.

For more information, or to obtain your copy of the 11” x 17” calendar of the full year’s tips, please contact John directly. A limited number of calendars will be available at the January 599 Meeting

January 2020:

• Inspect houseplants for white flies, spider mites and aphids. 
• Apply insecticidal soap and spray with water. 
• Inspect spring bulbs in storage. Discard soft or mouldy ones. 
• Not a problem yet this winter, but if there is a thaw and the snow melts, mound any remaining snow over roses and tender perennials. It’s the freeze/thaw cycle that kills the plants. 
• Expand personal knowledge through library visits, courses, catalogues, etc. 
• Think about and start planning your garden for next spring. 
• Google “Seed Catalogue Websites” and see hundreds of seed sources. 
• Order flower and vegetable seeds. Decide which seeds should be started inside. 
• Try forcing amaryllis and paperwhite narcissus for indoor winter bloom. 
• At the end of the month, start the slowest germinating seeds like begonias and geranium, also seeds for early spring bloom e.g. pansy, verbena, alyssum and dianthus.