May

It is the best time of year for planting especially summer bulbs, those which flower in the summer such as lilies, gladiolus, hemerocallis not forgetting annuals and perennials such as Cosmos Choca Mocca (surely plant of the year 2007!), Geraniums and Dahlia.
For Roses keep an eye open for pest and diseases and pop along to your library or charity shop and pick a book up on rose care and maintenance. It requires an encyclopaedia all by itself.
Those lawns will need regular mowing during the summer oh and a bit more feed (gently does it)
Bulbs which have finished flowering should be allowed to die back naturally. DO NOT mow, cut off or remove the foliage in any way as the bulb is now relying on this to store up energy for the following season flowers. Some bone meal will help.
A stitch in time saves name, the same applies for hoeing/weeding.
Spring flowering bedding plants will now need to be removed once they have finished flowering or you have had enough of them.
Remember it is still not too late for a ground frost, so do not plant out your half-hardy summer bedding plants until the end of the month.
This is the time to start watering your garden regularly, if it doesn’t rain and water newly planted plants even if it does. But do it carefully and avoid over watering use a trowel and check how far the water has gone in you’ll be surprised how much it takes and for greatest benefit do it the last thing at night or for those up with the lark early in the morning
Environmental bit: Remember last month I said that butterflies and insects feed on nectar and pollen, they also value plants for shelter and breeding. Therefore the more diverse (this months environmental technical word for different) your planting, the greater the number of insects and butterflies you are likely to attract.
If you like the idea of a wildlife garden but find the choice of plants too much, do as I do and let the garden run riot but make sure it doesn’t encroach on your neat and tidy bits.
Anyway I’m going back to finish digging a feed from my new crop of Jersey Royals. Simply unbeatable!

Next month: June (you may be already be spotting a trend by now).