By Better Homes & Garden
Welcome spring! Step outside and soak in the sights of the season as you tackle this month's garden chores. Enjoy these April gardening tips for the Northeast!
Tidy up spring-flowering bulbs by snipping spent blooms of daffodils and hyacinth. Don't braid or clip leaves. Their photosynthetic efforts fuel next year's flowers.
Test Garden Tip: If ripening bulb foliage is an eyesore, consider planting bulbs behind partners whose leaves will hide unsightly bulbs. Choices include peonies, daylilies, coral bells, tall sedum hybrids, or perennial geranium.
Create your own container full of bulbs.
For an instant spring show, fill containers with purchased forced spring bulbs from supermarkets and garden centers. Tuck in sweet alyssum for a ground-hugging, sweetly scented filler.
Dress spring pots with color, courtesy of flowers that love cool weather: pansy, viola, and snapdragon. Plant flowering stock for a spicy clove fragrance.
In northernmost regions and higher elevations, you can still plant cool-season crops. By seed, plant your radishes, peas, lettuces, and other greens; put in transplants of broccoli, cauliflower, and cabbage.
In warmer regions, the last average frost date is this month. Go ahead and plant seedlings of warm-season edibles (tomatoes, peppers, eggplants, basil) when all danger of frost has passed.
If you haven't already, get potatoes in the ground as soon as possible.
The best cold tolerant veggies.