Warm, sunny weekends in April get people anxious to get in their gardens.
However, it is important to do some necessary preparation before creating your personal backyard Garden of Eden.
Eric Hystek, a partner with Earthworks Garden Centre, said, "clean up is the big thing, cutting down all your ornamental grasses, all the dead leaves from your perennials."
He added a lot of people are going with a mulch, noting the benefits include "holding moisture in and regulating the temperature of the ground so roots stay cooler."
When it comes to preparing garden beds, Bill Ross, owner of Ross' Flowers, advises mixing in a compost or peat meat and add in a granular fertilizer to be worked into the soil before planting.
Ross said a granular fertilizer takes a little longer to dissolve, which is good if you put it in at the start of the season. He recommends a triple 7 or a triple 10 granular fertilizer.
A source of water and fertilizer is a must throughout the season, Ross said.
"If you want things to grow their best you should fertilize them throughout the season," he said.
"That's your biggest culprit, is people tend to let things dry out," he added. "Once they become dry they get under stress and they don't look too good."
When it comes to watering, Ross said a good rule of thumb is "if it's dry water it."
He said the best philosophy is to water your garden in the morning so plants have a chance to dry off during the day. He added there is less chance for disease or rotting than if the plant is wet at night when its cooler and darker.
When it comes to planting, Hystek said, "as far as your trees and shrubs go, it's a good time to plant those."
He added more tender plants, such as Japanese maples, could wait to be planted.
Hystek said some interesting trees and shrubs Earthworks has in stock include the crimson frost birch, which is a birch tree with a red leaf.
The garden centre also has the lime leafed smoke bush.
"Usually you see them with the burgundy leaf, but we've got one with the lime leaf," he said. "That's kind of a cool, new plant."
The black lace elderberry bush sold really fast last year and Hystek expects it will go well this year.
"People are trying to get different colours in the garden," he said, adding some people are using it as an alternative to the Japanese.
"It's a wispy-looking plant with a dark purple leaf."
Ross said his store has diamond frost, a variety euphorbia, which looks like baby's breath, for hanging baskets.
"It does a very nice job in the center of hanging baskets. It kind of grows in amongst everything and softens it," he said.
There is also a new variety of wax leaf begonia called Big, Ross said.
A traditional begonia will grow about 10 inches high, where this variety will reach two-feet high, he said.
"We try to handle a lot of more unusual things," Ross said, noting there is more than a dozen new selection of coleus that give bright colours.
