February is a good time to finish any winter projects before the growing season starts in earnest. There are still a few weeks left to complete any winter pruning and get bare-rooted trees in the ground while plants remain dormant. Vegetable beds can be prepared this month and snowdrops divided once they come to the end of their flowering period. Inside the house, start chitting potatoes and sowing chilli seeds to give plants a long growing season.
In this collection of clips from BBC Gardeners’ World, Monty is busy making a bog garden and pruning his apple trees. He also plants a fastigiate silver birch in one of his borders to commemorate the Queen’s Platinum Jubilee.
More from Monty:
- Monty’s favourite plants for shade
- Podcast: Monty on how we make Gardeners’ World TV
- Preparing for spring: Monty at Longmeadow
Winter pruning apple trees
Monty winter prunes his apple trees while they are still in their dormant period, to maximise the apple harvest later in the year.
Making a bog garden
Monty is making a new bog garden. He lines the trench with perforated plastic compost bags, tops with gravel and then starts to return the soil to the trench.
Planting a tree
In this clip from BBC Gardeners’ World in 2022, Monty demonstrates how to plant a fastigiate birch in a border as he commemorates the Queen’s Platinum Jubilee.
