The Garden Minute: Bird Baths, Early Bloomers & The Hanging Gardens of Basingstoke

☀️ Happy Friday Gardeners. The weekend is beckoning. Let's ease in with a little gardening goodness.

Feb 28, 2025

A round-up of tips, tricks and news snippets on all things garden-related.

✂️ Warning issued to anyone with a hedge in their back garden as key date approaches

🌸 Three summer flowers you should plant in your garden as soon as possible

🌿 Everlasting love: the romance of evergreen twining ivy

👩‍🌾 Chaos gardening: The fun, carefree and wild planting trend where all rules go out of the window

⛔ Revealed: 5 plants people regret ever putting in their gardens

🚰 Gardeners should feed hydrangeas one key thing before March

🐦‍⬛ Clever 1p trick to keep bird baths clean and free of algae

Plant Offer: Buy any 3 plants from Plant Drops for just £10.99

🗒️ If you do one thing this weekend …

Timely tasks for every stage of the season

There’s a definite shift in the air this week—nothing dramatic, but the days are feeling that little bit longer, and there’s a touch more warmth in the sunshine when it peeks through. It’s enough to make me hopeful that spring isn’t too far off now.

I’ve been making the most of the milder moments, tidying up the garden and checking on the first signs of life. The daffodils are pushing higher, and the snowdrops are looking very pretty. It’s still too early to get too enthusiastic with sowing, but I’ve sorted through my seed packets, making plans for what to plant first.

Indoors, my houseplants seem to be enjoying the extra daylight. I’ve given my spider plant babies new homes in their own pots. It’s satisfying to see them thrive!

This week I’ll be trying… With daylight increasing, I’ll be trying hardening off any early seedlings by placing them outside for short periods. I just need to remember to bring them back in before the temperature drops too much!