February 2022 Gardening Tips

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• Annuals - Primrose (perennial used as annual), Bellis perennis. 
• Perennials - Hellebores, Rhubarb, Cyclamen. 
• Shrubs and Trees - Pieris japonica, Daphne, Camellia, Sarcococca, Dodonaea, Rhododendron, Citrus (protect from frost). Shop for Magnolias when just starting to bloom to get the color you desire, Bareroot Fruit Trees.
• Spring Planted, Summer Flowering bulbs - Dahlia, Liatris spicata, Gladiolus, Crocosmia. 
• Seeds - California poppies, Larkspur, Nigella, Carrots, Beets.

• Shopping - There are lots of plants that flower in February! Visit your local nursery to see the blooms of Camellia, Hellebores, Forsythia, and Cyclamen. Also, smell what's fragrant, such as Yellow Primroses, Daphne, and the leaves of the ground cover, Yerba buena. 
• Watering - During dry spells in winter remember to give a short shower to winter annuals and other plants in the garden once or twice a week. The soil may still be damp but the leaves tend to get dehydrated from lack of rain.
• Pruning - Finish Pruning Roses. For good pest management, remember to clean up all the old leaves in, under and around roses. Buddleja davidii (Butterfly Bush) blooms on new growth. For the species (not the dwarf or variegated), prune down to 12 to 15 inches, removing approximately 1 in 5 of the older stems at ground level to encourage the plant to push new stems from the base of the plant. If your plant has never been pruned this way it may have a huge trunk now, prune down the thinner stems to the trunk section, leaving 6 or 8 inches of the healthy stems. Dwarf and Variegated Buddleja prefer a lighter pruning. Berberis can be pruned this month. Watch The Gardening Tutor video: How to Prune Berberis.  Prune Spiraea japonica by at least half to encourage a full plant (can be pruned to 6 inches). To learn how to get the most flowers from climbing roses: Watch The Gardening Tutor video: How to Prune a Climbing Rose   When you're ready to learn how to prune or have The Gardening Tutor prune for you Contact Mary to make your appointment.
• Pest Management - Camellias can suffer from petal blight, a reoccurring fungal disease. If all the blossoms turn brown before or soon after opening there's a good chance it is petal blight. On healthy Camellias, keeping spent and fallen blossoms cleaned up right away can help the plant stay healthy. It is difficult to cure petal blight once established. Winter veggies infestations of aphids can be managed with a strong spray of water to knock the aphids off, step up to insecticidal soap when water is not enough to manage the population.  
• Weeding - Manage weeds now to make spring planting more fun! Watch The Gardening Tutor video: Weeds How they Grow and How to Manage Them.  When weeding around seedlings or root vegetables use snips to cut out the weeds below the soil surface instead of pulling them, which can pull up the veggies too. 
• Bulbs - This is the time of year to start shopping for summer flowering bulbs that are planted now - spring. Choose bulbs that are heavy for their size and blemish free.  

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