Last updated on February 26th, 2021
What do I do for my garden in March? Well, if the ground is frozen and covered with a foot of snow, I simply mix up a double martini and wait for better weather. Otherwise, I get down and dirty with the following chores:
The March 2020 Garden Chores
Winter-Sowing. No matter how frigid the weather or how deep the snow, you can sow perennials and hardy annuals (including spinach) outdoors in make-shift greenhouses. Wait until late this month or early April to sow tender annuals and vegetables.
Need some gorgeous flowering plants to winter-sow? Check out this useful post.
Raised Beds. Top them off with either compost or finely-shredded leaves, as above. Give the leaves a light sprinkling of alfalfa meal, cottonseed-meal, or another organic source of nitrogen to hasten decay. Click here for details.
Save Your Newspapers! I rely on the New York Times and a layer of mulch to keep my garden beds weed-free for an entire season. Here’s the how-to.
Lawns. When the ground is dry enough not to damage grass, rake up the accumulation of twigs and branches.
Arborvitae. If heavy, wet snow has flattened branches, lash them back into place with twine. Stems should regain their upright habit over the course of spring and summer. More details.
Roses. Wait until the end of the month to uncover shrubs (you remembered to mulch them, right?). Prune the shrubs at your convenience but before the leaf buds break. (I prune my David Austin roses back by half; I do not prune my climbing roses, except to relieve them of dead wood.) Don’t try to prepare new beds until the ground is well thawed and the soil is workable.
Pruning. Cut out all dead wood from trees and shrubs. Also, prune for shapeliness Peegee hydrangeas, Rose of Sharon, and other shrubs that bloom in late summer. Cut Buddleja (the common “Butterfly Bush”) back to ground-level now, unless you want a monster-size shrub (like mine, pictured above).
Iris. Examine these and other perennials for signs of heaving. Especially if your garden has not been mulched, you will need to go over plantings and firm back roots dislodged by frost.
Spring-Flowering Trees & Shrubs. Any time now you can cut stems of forsythia, pussy willow, crab apple (above), and quince. Give the stems water, light, and warmth (65°F max), and they will bloom for you in only two weeks time. Click here for more branch-forcing ideas.
March 2020 Garden Chores: Indoor Plants
Houseplants. These are growing rapidly now, due to lengthening hours of daylight. Reward them with extra food and water. My collection of indoor plants, and how I care for them.
African Violets. Are yours refusing to bloom? Better read this post.
Forced Tulips & Other Dutch Bulbs. If forced in soil, continue to water and fertilize these hardy bulbs after their flowers fade. Once the foliage withers, withhold all moisture. Then remove the bulbs, and store them someplace cool and dry. In autumn, give them permanent positions in the outdoor garden. Pictured above is Tulipa ‘Quebec,’ now in bloom in my music room window garden. And be sure to read this helpful post — Forced Bulbs: What to Keep, and What to Toss.
Visit Your Local Flower and Garden Show!
Want to find good-sized plants at bargain prices? Visit your local garden-show. This year, New York’s Capital District Flower & Garden Show is March 27-29. On the final show-day, exhibiting landscape designers offer beautiful, in-bloom rhododendrons, lilacs, and other flowering shrubs as well as evergreens for a fraction of the retail price. Why? Because the greenhouse-forced plants were obtained strictly for design purposes. Landscape designers have little interest in keeping the goods once showtime is over. The rhododendrons in my Woodland Garden (that’s one of ’em pictured above) were all acquired via garden show.
Now, if my monthly gardening chores are helpful to you in some small way, then by all means speak up. Hearing from you always brightens my day.
Hungry for more? Get my email updates and subscribe to my YouTube channel.
Sheila says
I always enjoy and learn a lot from this site and your videos! I’m trying winter sowing for the first time after reading about it here- thanks!
Pam in Virginia says
Hi, Kevin!
Thank you for these timely reminders, especially the one about mulching with newspaper; I might have forgotten that.
Pam
Chris says
Thank you for the pruning advice. I am also in a 5b gardening zone, so your chore lists are always timely.
Donna Todd says
Here in Indiana spring can be a fickle friend–sometimes here, sometimes not. But I love the idea of being out in the garden and you remind me that it’s that hard, dirty spring work which yields the most tangible outcome in summer. Slogging around in the cool damp cutting back shrubs and ornamental grasses, picking up small limbs and twigs, reshaping bushes (so much easier to see what you’re doing without leaves on them), and all the rest of the hum drum chores really pay off come summer. I’m so anxious to get outside I don’t even mind the drudgery of it!!
Kara in zone 9 says
I always enjoy reading your blog, and I depend upon your advice re cooking and gardening…housekeeping in general, all the time. Thank you!❤️
Kay Wilson says
Fife Scotland calling
Wet and windy here
enjoying your garden and house posts
Notso different from us
Bev says
Kevin,
I always love your informative and fun posts!!!! Thank you for sharing your knowledge and experience with us!!
Bev
Carol Gifford says
Hi Kevin. I mulched my vegetable garden with shredded leaves last fall. Would coffee grounds (Starbucks) be a suitable replacement for the cotton seed or alfalfa meals to speed up decomposition?