What To Do In The Garden In April

“April is a time of wonder, when the spring peepers emerge from hibernation, and new green life appears from a seed or a root that has lain dormant in the earth all winter…”  April in the garden is normally a time of milder, warmer weather. Although as I was typing this post, the rain was lashing outside my window and it blowing a gale with yellow warnings for our part of South West England. Sigh. Fortunately, I took all my photos when we had blissfully sunny weather. So, on that more optimistic note, let’s take a look at this month’s garden tasks and what to do in your garden in April.

What To Do In The Garden In April

Regular readers will know I break my garden updates down into sections: flowers, vegetables, fruits, jobs, wildlife. So, while I hope you’ll enjoy the full article with this month’s garden tasks and all my April gardening tips, please feel free to skip to whatever you want to read about most too 🙂

April In The Flower Garden

Spring bulbs make up the majority of the flowering plants in April at least in our garden. The daffodils and narcissi are flowering their hearts out in the orchard. And having planted different varieties of bulbs last Autumn, the early ones are ready for dead heading now – you want to pinch off just behind the seed heads but leave the stalks and leaves intact to continue to feed the bulbs for new flowers next year. The later flowering ones will carry on providing a fabulously scented display for a few more weeks yet – they’re perfect plants for April.

Another of my favourite bulbs are these pretty little blue Muscari or Grape Hyacinths. They showcase the delicate Snakeshead Fritilleria, contrast with the yellow Tete-a-Tetes, and support the purple Tulips beautifully, don’t you think? Cheap to buy and easy to grow, they’re a Spring garden staple.

Speaking of tulips, I’m glad to see the orange tulips in last year’s pots are still going strong, as well as the purple and red tulips that I planted in our woodland border last Autumn. Tip: tulips are fabulous Spring flowers – they look great in pots, in the ground, and cut for indoor displays too. I particularly love this pink and white bloom, which I think looks like an angry little lion! When they go over, I’ll dead head them all too, same as the daffs and narcissi.

I’m also loving the blue of forget-me-knots and the delicate little blooms on our hardy perennial Brunneras (Jack Frost). They actually look very similar, don’t they?

Our garden in April (well, orchard really) is still home to masses of wild primroses and even a few primula, some of which I’ve transplanted to our new herbaceous garden borders where we can see them more easily.

It’s good to see that the recent frosts haven’t killed off the blooms on our Camellias. Such beautiful shrubs, they need zero attention now they’ve established. Camellias are supposed to prefer acid soil (our soil is more neutral) but ours don’t seem to mind. And our Magnolia is getting bigger and bushier too – I love those stunning purple goblet-shaped blooms.

Some lovely splashes of colour are coming from the pink Bellis and Pansy bedding plants in one of our herbaceous borders. I must buy some more to fill in other gaps now 🙂

A couple of April flowering shrubs (both perennials) giving us joy are the Euphorbias with their zingy green flowers and foliage, and the sweetly scented Skimmias. The bees absolutely adore the Skimmias, which is lovely to see.

Over in our woodland area are some flowers you really have to get down low to fully appreciate, like these pretty little wild pink cyclamen and beautiful little wild violets, which have a sweet fragrance out of all proportion to their size.

Also at floor level are our purple and white Vinca Minor (periwinkle) plants. They make excellent ground cover and seem happy where not much else grows. They’re also seriously invasive, so I’ll need to keep an eye on both to contain any unwanted spreading. Pretty little plants though, aren’t they?

We have some gorgeous white Lunaria (Honesty) glowing in the dark shade of the wall again. Lunaria are biennials, meaning they flower every two years, so if you scatter some seed for two years running, you’re pretty much guaranteed a perpetual supply of spring blooms. Nearby are our gorgeous Summer Snowflakes – they look like snowdrops but they’re much taller and more graceful. I planted 3 pots some years back and now they’ve all grown together in one huge and lovely clump.

Our Hellebores started blooming in January and are still going strong. Not cheap plants to buy but they last for YEARS – tip: look on the sale tables at garden centres this month. Don’t worry about any dead foliage on top, as long as their roots are healthy, they’ll be absolutely fine to plant out. Another sale table find from last year is the yellow Marsh Marigold on the edge of our pond – she’s settled in very happily and flowering her heart out.

Lastly, do you remember the second batch of Sweet Pea* seeds I sowed in the greenhouse in January? Just look at the growth on them in the last few weeks, they’ll be ready to plant out in early May, I think.

April In The Vegetable Garden

Following on from last month, our January-sown Broad Beans* are now planted out into a raised bed, and covered over with some horticultural fleece* to protect them from frosts and prowling aphids. Tip: pinch out the top shoots before you plant out, to encourage the plants to grow bushier rather than stay spindly.

And I’ve sown some more seeds too: French Beans* and Sweetcorn* in the greenhouse, and our favourite ‘Rainbow Blend’ F1 Hybrid tomatoes* and Burpless Tasty Green cucumbers* which I’m keeping indoors to germinate.

Not really a vegetable but I don’t have a Herbs section, so here’s a shot of one of our many Fennel plants, looking happy and healthy. In true potager garden fashion, I’m growing fennel in our flower beds as I cut the feathery fronds for foliage fillers in our vases as well as using them in the kitchen. And spot the fresh new shoots of the Nepeta (cat mint) coming through – Spooky certainly hasn’t missed them…

Also not vegetables, but I don’t have a Fungi section either, so here are the delicate little brown mushrooms growing wild in our orchard. I have no idea what they are, or if they’re edible, and I don’t intend to find out the hard way either!

April In The Fruit Garden

Fruit in April is still not ready to harvest but, provided we don’t get any late frosts, we should have some bumper crops later this year. It’s still so wild to me that every single one of these tiny buds has the potential to become an apple, blackcurrant, or pear.

Not forgetting our potential cherry and peach crops either.

Or our Japanese quince and cornucopia of wild strawberries.

I never know whether to categorise our scented pelargoniums as flowers or fruit – technically I suppose flowers, but we do harvest lots of edible pelargonium leaves for herb teas. They overwintered in our conservatory but now I’ve moved them into the greenhouse, to begin acclimatising them to life outdoors when it gets warmer. Attar of Roses on the left and Orange Fizz on the right – aren’t their blooms pretty?

General April Gardening Jobs

April gardening jobs are all about dead heading, tying in new growth, and keeping on top of the weeding. Top of my April gardening to do list is to sow some hardy annuals for summer flowering bedding plants. Over in the greenhouse I’ve started off some of my favourite Spanish Lavender, night-scented Stocks*, vibrant blue Cornflowers*, and neon pink Nasturtiums*. And better late than never, I’ve sown some purple Cobea Scandens vine* seeds too. What else can you sow in April? With the soil warming up quite quickly now, you could try direct sowing carrots* and fast growing radishes for an early harvest.

April lawn care isn’t too complicated, it’s all about repair and maintenance. You can sow seed or cut turf to fill in any bare patches, and now’s a good time to rake any dead moss out of your lawn as well. Although we have so much moss that it would be a marathon job, so our mantra is live and let live. Alan is continuing to cut the grass on a high blade setting, being careful to mow around all our patches of Spring bulbs in the orchard.

April Gardening For Wildlife

We’re all for encouraging wildlife in our garden and part of that is keeping the feeders topped up with quality wild bird food* and high energy fat balls* on a daily basis, to help the garden birds well-fed all year round.

We’re lucky to have plenty of space so we have three ponds – two small ones and one much larger one, which was Alan’s lockdown project when he got bored with watching Boris & Co address the nation. April pond care tip: now all the frogs have left, I’ve cleared away all the dead reeds and other vegetation (they were good hiding places from the resident heron while the frogs were mating and laying their frogspawn).

Just look at the seething masses of tadpoles that have hatched though – Flora is in her pond dipping element.

And I said all the frogs had gone, but look who I found hiding happily in a log pile at the bottom of our orchard. I know at least one of my blogger pals will disagree with me, but isn’t he/she cute? 🙂

Our Garden In April

And that concludes my fourth garden post of 2023. I hope you’ve found it a useful guide and reminder of things to do in your garden in April. And that you’ll join me next month for my May garden update when even more tulips and some alliums should be flaunting themselves. In the meantime, may I wish you a peaceful and productive remainder of April, whatever you’re up to – I hope you manage to stay warm and dry!

Did you enjoy your virtual visit to our garden and orchard this April? What was your favourite tip or photo? What are you loving in your garden or outside spaces this month?

* This post features affiliate links but all opinions are my own (see my Disclaimer).