March Gardening
February 28, 2014
By Joel Gillespie
February 28, 2014
(Dear March – Come in)
Emily Dickenson
DEAR March, come in!
How glad I am!
I looked for you before.
Put down your hat—
You must have walked—
How out of breath you are!
Dear March, how are you?
And the rest?
Did you leave Nature well?
Oh, March, come right upstairs with me,
I have so much to tell!
I got your letter, and the bird’s;
The maples never knew
That you were coming,—I declare,
How red their faces grew!
But, March, forgive me—
And all those hills
You left for me to hue;
There was no purple suitable,
You took it all with you.
Who knocks? That April!
Lock the door!
I will not be pursued!
He stayed away a year, to call
When I am occupied.
But trifles look so trivial
As soon as you have come,
That blame is just as dear as praise
And praise as mere as blame.
So, welcome March, come on in and have a seat!
March is a very busy month in the South Carolina garden, but it can be tricky, complicated by the ever changing weather. In March the weather is gradually getting warmer, and there may even be some hot days, but then bam! – we have a hard freeze. March.
Plants are gradually coming out of dormancy in March, with different timing for different plants. Most people think the key to breaking dormancy is temperature but it isn’t. The primary factor is length of day, though actually it is the length or decreasing length of the night that is even more key. There is a complex biochemical process in a plant that in effect allows it to know when the nights have become short enough to trigger the break of dormancy. And blooming isn’t necessarily a sign of dormancy break. Many plants like camellia bloom when in dormancy.
All the same clean up stuff that works in January and February still works in March — cleaning out beds of ivy, dead wood, tree saplings, various vines etc. All the plants you actually like or want will appreciate the clean up. It’s an ideal time for selective pruning of some small trees like crape myrtle or chaste tree — emphasis on selective.
If you are going to plant any trees or shrubs this spring, the earlier the better. March is for planting. It is also good for digging, dividing and transplanting perennials like daisies, black eyed Susan’s, day lilies, ornamental grasses etc.
If you have well established knock out roses this would be the time to cut them back. Be ready to fertilize when the leaves start to break out. I like using a good rich top dressing of compost for roses. If your butterfly bushes are still huge from last season, cut those back too.
Early March is still a good time to put out bare-rooted roses.
Speaking of fertilizer, mid to late March is generally a good time to fertilize your shrubs as they break dormancy and begin to grow new leaves. But don’t overdo it!
This is a really good time also to prune boxwood. I did say prune. This raises a pet gardening peeve of mine — the sheering of shrubs with hedge trimmers. There is a place for sheering, but really only if accompanied by pruning. But please don’t apply hedge trimmers to boxwood except for little ones making up an small ornamental hedge, and only after pruning first. Keep hedge trimmers away from larger American or English boxwood!
What happens when you attack a plant with hedge trimmers is two fold. First, all the new growth proceeds upward from the level where those cuts have been made. Second, this dense growth forms a thick barrier keeping light from the rest of the plant below. So you end up with two to three inches of dense growth with no leaves down inside the plant. This approach also hinders air movement which promotes fungal growth. This is terrible for most shrubs and especially so for boxwood.
Many people have boxwood-like foundation plants that are actually not boxwood at all, but hollies. Dwarf yaupon hollies are commonly used now. If you want to know which you have, look at the leaves. If the leaves come out from the stem opposite each other you have a boxwood. If the leaves alternate one on one side and up a bit, one on the other, you have a holly.
Hollies take more abuse than boxwood and can on occasion be cut all the way down with good result, but for every day care, prune before you sheer. By that I mean cut as many of the worst offender twigs or branches deeper into the plant. To deal with the problem of past shearing I like to pat the top of the plant with my hand. If I feel a stub, that is usually a branch that needs to be cut deeper into the plant. Pruning this way allows light into the plant interior which stimulates new growth of leaves deeper into the plant. And if you must sheer, pruning first makes the result look much less ragged and much softer. But in my opinion sheering is almost never a good idea.
You may be tempted to cut back your hydrangea sticks. Don’t, unless you are absolutely positive the stick is dead, or if you are positive you have white hydrangeas that bloom on the current season’s growth. But I wouldn’t do anything with them now.
Pittosporum, cleyera, chindo viburnum, hollies of all kinds, tea olives, photina (red tips) – March is a good time to shape ’em up! You can also cut back major shoots of loropetalum, the ones falling into your path way or covering your window. You will lose the blooms of course but the rest of the plant will bloom.
Any time of year is a good time to call the tree service and have them remove whatever broken messy remnants of bradford pear you may still have over shading your yard – it may as well be March.
Let’s talk a little about camellias – camellia sasanqua and camellia japonica. There are four issues typically facing camellias, especially older ones.
First, you may notice that the leaves are yellowed. This is usually a sign of iron deficiency. You can get a product in the garden department called iron chelate which will help a lot. Wait until about half way through the month and then apply.
Second your camellias may be afflicted with scale. If you see yellow blotches on the leaves look underneath. If there is white stuff underneath it’s likely scale, a little insect that sucks the juices out of the leaf. A little scale is OK, but a lot can really hinder your plant’s growth. It may be too late to use dormant scale horticultural oil and it really is a nasty business to apply the stuff, though it works. I am not generally a fan of pesticides but bad scale is impervious to most home treatments. There is a product you can get at the garden center, or at the John Deere store in larger quantity, that is a systemic — it is taken up by the plant and will kill insects like scale and aphids sucking on the plant juices. The active ingredient is imidacloprid. It may take two or three treatments over the course of the spring but mid March is a good time to start. The same active ingredient can be used for aphid problems in water oaks, hackberries, and crape myrtles. If you see a lot of black goo on your bushes or on your deck, this is a mold growing in aphid or scale or white fly poop. It isn’t terribly harmful but it’s ugly and can be a little gross on decks and furniture
Third, your camellia may be massively overgrown for the space it is in. It is no easy task bringing an old camellia down to size. Radical cutting is usually not best for camellias. Best to get at them from the top, taking several of the very tallest branches all the way back to the trunk, and taking out a select number of trunks if you have a multiple trunk plant. This process can take two to three years but it is worth the trouble.
Fourth, many camellias are simply way too dense. There are too many branches, too many twigs, too many buds. You may notice that the branches are just laying on top of one another. If you want beautiful flowers in the fall you need fewer and healthier branches and buds. The camellia needs to be thinned. This can be done for all camellias and sasanquas this month, after blooming of course.
March, especially later in the month, is when perennials start to roll into the garden centers and nurseries. This is time to start planting for sure!
Nobody likes to weed. Just remember, weeding before seeding. Get the suckers out before they mature and make babies…
Lawns are still dormant. Don’t mess with ’em in March. Wait until April.
Well, that should be enough for now.
Joel Gillespie
Gardening and Such
[email protected]
joelgillespie.com
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