16 Spring Gardening Tasks to Do Right Now Before the Start of the Season

Screen Your Photos for Ideas

Chances are, you have lots of gardening photos on your phone—highlights to show off or failures to mourn. Comb through your photos and organize all your gardening pics in separate folders.

Take notes on which plants prospered and which did poorly that you should probably avoid growing this year. Taking inventory helps you make good choices about what to plant this year.

The deep dive into your photos also helps you fill in any gaps you might have in the bloom sequence. For example, you might realize that you have very few or no photos of flowers after Labor Day. This could be your cue to add fall-blooming native perennials to your landscape to fill that gap.

Prune Trees and Shrubs

The time to prune most trees and many shrubs is during their winter dormancy. If you haven’t pruned them yet, do it promptly.

But make sure not to prune any shrubs that are blooming on old wood, these are typically spring-blooming shrubs such as azaleas, lilacs, and viburnums that have already formed the flower buds for this year’s bloom.

Wait until after their spring bloom to prune them. Summer-blooming shrubs such as bigleaf and panicle hydrangea and repeat-blooming roses are pruned in late winter or very early spring before they leaf out.

Check Plants for Frost Heave

Extreme temperature fluctuations and freeze-and-thaw cycles during the winter cause the water in the soil to expand and contract, which leads to frost heave where the plant and its roots get pushed out of the ground.

Perennials with shallow root systems and those that have been planted late in the fall are especially susceptible to frost heave.

Gently push frost-heaved plants back into the ground so their roots are no longer exposed to the air.

Clean up Flower Beds

Your vegetable garden should have been cleaned up thoroughly in the fall to prevent pests and diseases from overwintering.

Flower and perennial beds, however, are different. Delay cleaning them up until daytime temperatures are in the 50s— butterflies, moths, fireflies, and native bees overwinter in dead leaves and stalks.

Pick up any sticks and fallen branches, then gently rake leaf litter and other debris, taking care not to damage the tips of emerging spring bulbs and other perennials.

Trim Perennials

Remove any dead and tattered leaves from your perennials but don’t cut the stems back to the crown or base of the plant. Instead, leave 15 to 20 inches of the stems standing.

Solitary native bee species lay their eggs in the pithy centers of the stems in the spring and the larvae will emerge from them in the summer.

Do a Soil Test

Garden soil should be tested at least every three years to make sure that soil fertility and pH are where they should be. Soil test kits are available from your local Extension Office.

Your soil samples are tested in a specialized soil laboratory, and you’ll get recommendations for the proper amendments to add to the soil for the crops or type of plants you are planning to grow.

Amend the Soil

Even if you naturally have nutrient-rich, well-draining soil in your yard, amending the soil regularly with organic matter is necessary so it stays healthy and productive.

Keep in mind that soil is not static, it is subject to a lot of variables from the whims of nature. Growing vegetables heavily depletes the soil of nutrients that need to be returned to it in the form of compost, aged manure, or other organic matter.

Ideally, soil should be amended in the fall so the organic matter is broken down over the winter, but you can still do it in the late winter or early spring, as long as you let it settle for at least a month.

Divide Perennials

Late winter or early spring is the time to divide any perennials that are getting too dense or whose centers are dying (dividing them rejuvenates the plant). Dig up the root clumps when the soil is ready to be worked but before the buds open up and leaves emerge.

Divide the clump into smaller sections, remove any dead or diseases parts, and replant the sections in a new suitable location at the same depth as the original plant.

Plan Your Vegetable Garden

Whether you map out your garden on paper or use an online garden planner is a question of personal preference. The important thing is that you plan your garden as detailed as you can—it’s the only way to effectively manage your garden space—what crops to plant and where.

Make sure to keep your records of every gardening year because you should never plant members of the same plant family, such as cucumbers and squash, in the same spot in consecutive years.

Procure Seeds

With gardening becoming more popular every year, don’t delay getting your seeds for the upcoming gardening season. You don't necessarily need to buy all your seeds, there are also ways to get seeds for free. Especially if you have your eyes on specific varieties, supply is limited.

Having your seeds lined up early is also important for starting your seeds indoors to get a head start on the growing season, and for seeds that require stratification (many native plant seeds require 60 days of cold moist stratification.

Line up Your Supplies

Make a list of all the supplies and disposables that you typically need during the gardening season, such as different fertilizers, pesticides, herbicides, gardening gloves, bug repellents, etc. If possible, stock up on the hard-to-find items, so you won’t waste time locating them at the height of the gardening season.

Spray Fruit Trees

Even if you are an organic gardener, you need to practice pest and disease control of your fruit trees. Spray them with a combination of dormant horticultural oil and liquid copper fungicide to protect the trees against pests and diseases that overwinter on the trees.

The proper timing is key; the products, both of which are organic, are mixed with water and should be applied while the trees are fully dormant between December and January or at the latest in February before the buds begin to swell.

Horticultural oil controls scale insects, mites, and the eggs of aphids and caterpillars. Liquid copper acts as a fungicide. Follow the label for directions.

Start Weeding

Start weeding as soon as the ground is soft and dry enough to be worked. While many annual weeds will only emerge later in the season, this is a good time to get a head start on perennial weeds such as lesser celandine that forms dense mats. Dig up as much of the roots as possible.

Remove Mulch

As the weather warms up, remove any thick layers of mulch that you placed around herbaceous perennials in the fall to insulate them against the winter cold. Don’t scrape away the entire mulch layer; leave a 1-inch layer, which will allow plants to emerge. Mulch around the base of trees and shrubs can remain in place, as it does not obstruct any new growth in the spring.

Get Your Gardening Tools in Shape

Take advantage of a rainy Saturday afternoon and do an inventory of your garden tools. Clean and sanitize them with one part chlorine bleach and nine parts water. Remove any rust. Sharpen blades and edges, oil moving components, and replace worn or cracking handles.

Empty Planters and Containers

If you haven’t emptied last year’s planting pots and containers yet, now is the time. Remove the potting soil and sanitize the pots with a mixture of one part bleach to nine parts water.

You don’t necessarily have to throw the potting soil in the trash—add it to flower beds or your compost bin. Recycling old potting soil without refreshing is not recommended, as the potting soil is likely depleted of nutrients. To play it safe, use fresh potting soil because old potting soil may harbor pests and diseases.