Everything is swelling at the moment: rivers, streams, buds, bulbs and, of course, the dawn chorus. Nature is pregnant with life, so it is a good idea to get ahead of the game for when everything comes out.

Get your garden mojo working by repairing and cleaning your compost heaps and boxes. If you are active in the garden or the kitchen, you are bound to produce organic waste. Accelerate the decomposition of green matter by adding 50 mm layers of soil per 300mm and as many worms as you can find. The rewards will be plentiful, including the rich smell of humus: enough to encourage you out from in front of the telly I am sure!

Tasks this month include:

Prune and thin winter jasmine so it doesn’t become too leggy in the coming year.
Cut back Cornus (dogwood) shrubs to about 75 mm from the ground, unless it is a slow growing variety such as Midwinter fire. For these, cut hard half of the oldest stems.
Salix (willow) grown for colourful stems can now be cut back hard too.
Clumps of perennials that have become choked or oversized can be divided: use two forks back to back, pulling the handles together to pull the plant apart.
Add fertiliser or well-rotted compost to hungry plants such as roses and clematis as well as containers that have been depleted over the years, of nutrients.
Prune shrub roses by about one third and cut back climbing roses by about the same, tying in any loose ends.
Keep a close eye on borders where you know weeds will be a problem: try to stay on top of them (I know, I know, easier said than done), by regular hoeing. It knocks them back and makes even the worst perennial weeds more manageable.
The pest we love to detest - the slug, will begin to make its presence felt. Beer traps, a copper band on pots and grit on the soil will all help to deter them. Failing that, build a pond to encourage frogs!
When turning compost, be wary of damaging any overwintered wildlife.
Bundles of hollow stems placed in quiet corners of the garden, will encourage the laying of eggs by insects, including bees.
Any sort of nesting material left outside, such as wool or hair, is likely to be snapped up by industrious garden birds making their nests for the coming season.

With the extraordinarily large amount of rainfall we have experienced, it is easy to be downcast at the prospect of working in the garden. Pretty soon it will all change… as it always does.

I will put money on the fact that we will be complaining about a drought in 6 months’ time!