10 gardening tips for March

At last, it's time to start planting seeds for vegetables. March is also the month to get your garden tidy.

1. Sow tomatoes, peppers, salads indoors. Place on a sunny windowsill and label with the date. You might like to make your own newspaper pots to do this.
2. It’s time to plant ‘early potatoes’ – plant them at a trowel’s depth.
3. Outdoors, try risk-free vegetables that don’t mind the cold: carrots, peas, broad beans, spinach, radish, parsnips and leeks. You need labels, finely raked soil and a cane to help you sow straight. Sprinkle seed in at twice the depth of the seed and lightly cover. Water, label and protect early sowings.
4. Plant herbaceous perennials (plants which come back year after year). Lift and divide established perennial plants now to improve their vigour and create new plants for your garden. To increase stock and promote flowering, split and divide herbaceous perennials, replanting only the most vigorous, healthy portions into refreshed soil.
5. Protect the blossom on wall-trained trees if frosty; hand-pollinate them if early flowering.
6. Repot orchids and other houseplants before they start into active growth again. Take the opportunity to clean the leaves too. Start to increase their watering and give them a boost with a feed.
7. If you’ve grown green manures over the winter, now is the time to dig them in while their stems are still soft.
8. Start to deadhead bulbs to improve next year’s flowers.
9. Cut off the old leaves of Hellebores to remove any foliar diseases and make the spring flowers more visible.
10. Finish cutting back shrubs grown for their colourful winter stems such as Cornus alba and Salix cultivars. Cut them back to their bases. You could display the stems in a vase.