10 core skills for every gardener

Planting

1 Planting is one of the first skills any gardener tries, and it’s a crucial step. Doing it well makes the difference between a thriving or sickly plant.

■ How

Good soil preparation is vital (see p64): it ensures plants settle in quickly and flourish. Planting into unprepared soil is akin to building a house without proper foundations.

Weed the planting site thoroughly, and in particular remove the roots of long-lived (perennial) weeds or you’ll be battling them for years.

Dig a planting hole slightly larger than the pot or the root system of a bare-root plant. Nearly all plants should be positioned at the same depth they were growing previously. Exceptions that benefit from deeper planting include roses, which should have the knobbly ‘graft union’ below ground, and clematis.

Before planting, soak the plant’s roots until thoroughly moist, and if the soil is dry, fill the hole with water and leave to drain. Remove the plant from its pot and loosen any circling roots. With bare-root plants, spread out the roots. Sprinkle mycorrhizal fungi over the roots to help them get established. Look for this sold in sachets in good garden centres.

Backfill around the roots using the excavated soil, firm all around with your heel, then water well.

■ Do it now

Autumn is the best time to plant anything hardy, when the soil is moist, warm and perfect for root growth, but you can plant all year round.

A bonus of autumn or winter planting is that you have the option to buy bare-root plants, which are easily dispatched, often cheaper and without plastic pots – see p50 to find out more. It’s also time to plant spring bulbs