What to do in your garden during April

In dry continental and highveld, summer-rainfall regions do the following the garden.

Plant & Sow

Annuals

Sow all summer-flowering annuals like:

Vegetables

Sow vegetables like:

Garden Maintenance

General garden maintenance

• Spray apples, pears and quinces against codling moth, and peaches against fruit fly.
• Water citrus trees well every three weeks and spray against citrus psylla; water other fruit trees thoroughly every second week.
• Keep the soil well mulched.
• Consider installing a rainwater tank. Many container-grown plants do best if watered with rainwater.
• Stake dahlias and water and fertilize them regularly.
• Mulch roses well.
• Cut back chrysanthemums.
• Deadhead roses regularly.
• Sow lawn seed.
• Transplant primula seedlings.
• Prepare trenches for sweet peas.
• Feed and mulch hydrangeas, and remove the dead flowerheads from the bushes.
• Spray apricots, cherries, nectarines, peaches and plums against fruit fly; and apples, pears and quinces against codling moth.
• Water citrus every three weeks in dry weather, and spray with insecticide.
• Feed fruit trees after the fruit are harvested.

For April maintenance tips on watering, pruning, pests and disease, fertilizing and much more visit our countrywide maintenance guide.