You’d be surprised at how much more you can get done in your garden with just that one or two extra days a bank holiday gives you. Depending on the time of year, we give you some suggestions on what you can really get into when the bank holiday rolls around.
Spring bank holidays
The busiest time of the calendar year for any gardener, there are plenty of gardening jobs to be undertaking in spring
- Turn over your old flower beds and preparing them for planting. You can do this by hand, or to make it easier, by using a cultivator.
- Using a brush cutter or grass trimmer (also known as a line trimmer) removing any seed heads off plants you want reseeding in your garden.
- Prune dead wood off fruit trees. This is also your last chance to prune trees and shrubs back in general. This will encourage new, rigorous growth as well as increased flower and fruit production.
- Strim around the base of fruit trees to suppress weeds that steal nutrients from the tree. It’s best to use a grass trimmer for this task as opposed to something as large as a ride on mower as it wouldn’t be able to get close enough to the tree without risk of damaging it.
- Depending on how mild the spring is, mow your lawn for the first time this year with a cordless lawn mower.
Summer bank holidays
The height of the growing season, summer is still a busy time of year for every gardener. Here’s what you can do to keep yourself busy in the garden over a summer bank holiday:
- Mow the lawn. It’s an obvious one we know, but it will no doubt need to be done. Before you get out your battery lawn mower, think if you’d like to use your grass clippings for mulching or collect the clippings by attaching the collection box.
- Carry out some lawn care and maintenance. This is especially true if the bank holiday happens to fall during a summer heatwave.
- Keep hedges under control and trim them back using a hedge trimmer.
- Cut back any areas overgrown with weeds and other unwanted plants like nettles and brambles. Grassy weeds can be tackled with a grass trimmer or lawn mower, however tougher plants like brambles are best being cut back with a brush cutter.
- Harvest summer fruits like raspberries, blackcurrants and strawberries.
Autumn bank holidays
Autumn is all about tidying up your garden and preparing it for the winter months so diseases don’t crop up come the following growing season. Here’s what to do in the garden during an autumn bank holiday:
Carrying out a final mow on your lawn with a lawn mower, and then giving it a thorough clean before you put it away for the winter.
- Removing fallen leaves from your garden and pathways with a leaf blower.
- Turning over your garden beds so they are broken down by frost over the winter.
- Harvest autumn fruit like apples, pears and blackberries.
- Now is the earliest time you can start pruning your trees and shrubs using either a pole saw or chainsaw. Any that still have fruit on should be left until the last of the fruit has been harvested. Make sure to put the pruned wood to good use around the garden.
- Sow seeds that are native and well adapted to colder climates. These include foxgloves, yarrow and cabbage.
- Plant strawberry runners to give them a good start come spring.
Winter bank holidays
During the dormant season, there is not much to do in the garden itself, however there is still a lot of maintenance and preparation jobs to be done:
- Maintenance of any tools you plan to use in spring like a battery hedge trimmer, cordless lawn mower, cultivator, battery leaf blower, EGO Rotocut, grass trimmer or brush cutter and battery chainsaw.
- Pruning your trees and shrubs back with either a pole saw or chainsaw to encourage vigorous growth in spring.
- Towards the end of winter, sow seeds in readiness for growth in the spring.
- Plant garlic bulbs - the traditional date to do this is Boxing Day. However, planting your garlic a few weeks either side of this date is no issue either.