Gardening in a much too warm February
We are starting 2025 - at least in the east and south of Austria - in a much too warm and dry February. Today it was wonderfully warm and we #Beetschwestern spent our afternoon in the garden under a beautiful blue sky. There are already some jobs that we can do and some that, despite our impatience and joy at the beautiful weather, we'd better leave alone.
What we can do well
Our lawn was littered with leaves due to several strong storms - we can easily remove these when the temperature is above zero, as we no longer have any snow due to the high temperatures and low precipitation.
This also affected our privacy fence, which we are repairing in the much too warm February temperatures.
If there are a few days with plus temperatures, we can also start pruning the first shrubs and hedges as well as fruit trees and climbing plants so that we can finish at some point. It is also possible to prune suckers to graft fruit trees. Please only prune on frost-free days!
If you have grown winter vegetables such as lamb's lettuce, you can harvest them on frost-free days. You can now also find scattered chickweed, which is also very healthy!
We can now also mix our own growing soil consisting of one third each of molehill soil, compost/humus and sand. Then place this in portions on a baking tray and bake at around 130 degrees for 3/4 of an hour to kill off unwanted seeds and the like. It is then ready for use!
It is usually still too early to grow young vegetable plants, except for chillies. These can already be grown on a bright, warm windowsill.
If you have outdoor plants in containers, you should water them from time to time on frost-free days to prevent them from drying out over the winter.
What we should not do (yet):
We do NOT cut roses yet, but wait until the forsythia blooms.
Do NOT put winter-flowering plants in pots (e.g. snow roses and Christmas roses) outside, but wait until the end of winter.
We should leave our perennials standing and not cut them back; the same applies to lavender and other southern plants, which could otherwise freeze back too much.
We wish you all a wonderful time in the fresh air!
