Hands-on jobs

How To

Browse 356 guides Open Plant Finder

Follow clear steps for everyday garden jobs. Know what to use, when to begin and what success looks like.

UK seasons Plain advice Free to read

Choose where to begin

Useful advice, organised around your next job

Garden jobs become easier when the timing and method are clear. These 356 practical guides explain which tools to use, when to start and what to check afterwards. Advice is organised for British seasons and conditions. Each page gives you a direct route through the task. Choose a common job below, or browse the newest step-by-step guides.

Recommended first

Start with a popular guide

Quick routes into the questions gardeners ask most often.

June Garden Jobs

A week-by-week task list for the early summer garden.

How to Prune Roses

Make clean cuts at the right time for healthier growth.

Hot Weather Watering

Put water where roots can use it during dry spells.

Make Comfrey Feed

Turn one productive plant into useful liquid feed.

Store Root Crops

Keep your harvest sound through the colder months.

From the library

The latest how-to guides

356 guides in this section

Plant pot sizes lined up on a Midlands patio, from a 9cm module through 2L, 5L and 10L nursery pots to a 25L specimen pot

How To 18 July 2026 14 min read

Plant Pot Sizes: Litres to CM Made Simple

UK plant pot sizes decoded. Convert litres to cm, match pots to root balls, and pick the right size for shrubs, herbs, tomatoes and trees.

What to do in the garden in April, a Norfolk seaside garden with seedlings in a cold frame and a windbreak hedge behind

How To 18 July 2026 14 min read

What to Do in the Garden in April: Priorities

What to do in the garden in April, ranked by what matters if you only get two weekends. Last frost dates by region, hardening off and pest watch.

What to do in the garden in February: a Sheffield allotment with bare beds, cloches

How To 18 July 2026 13 min read

What to Do in the Garden in February: 13 Jobs

What to do in the garden in February in the UK. The 13 jobs that pay off, exact germination temperatures, and why starting too early wastes a season.

What to do in the garden in January: a frosted Derbyshire garden at first light with bare fruit trees

How To 18 July 2026 13 min read

What to Do in the Garden in January: 12 Jobs

What to do in the garden in January in the UK. The 12 jobs worth doing at 4C soil, what you must not prune yet, and honest north-south timings.

What to do in the garden in March, a Bristol suburban raised bed with a soil thermometer pushed into freshly raked tilth

How To 18 July 2026 14 min read

What to Do in the Garden in March: Soil First

What to do in the garden in March, ordered by soil temperature not the calendar. Sowing thresholds, first lawn cut, pruning and regional timings.

Drip irrigation kit with 13mm supply pipe and drippers watering raised vegetable beds on a UK allotment

How To 17 July 2026 14 min read

Best Drip Irrigation Kits for UK Gardens

The best drip irrigation kits for UK gardens ranked: micro-drip for pots, inline dripline for rows, and gravity systems for allotments with no mains.

A pineapple top rooted and growing as a young Ananas comosus rosette on a bright UK windowsill

How To 17 July 2026 13 min read

How to Grow a Pineapple From a Shop Top

How to grow a pineapple from a top in the UK: root the crown in 6-10 weeks, then keep it above 18C for two to three years to maybe fruit.

Hedgelaying: freshly laid hawthorn hedge with vertical stakes and twisted binders on a bare winter UK field boundary

How To 17 July 2026 14 min read

Hedgelaying: How to Lay a Hedge by Hand

Hedgelaying explained: how to lay a hedge with a billhook, the regional styles, the best species, and when to do it in the UK winter.

A row of pleached hornbeam trees beside a stone garden wall, clear stems below flat trained panels of leaves

How To 17 July 2026 14 min read

Pleached Trees: How to Plant and Support

How to plant and support pleached trees in the UK: species, spacing, the training frame, staking, tying in and pruning twice a year for instant privacy.

Western red cedar hedge with flat scale-leaf sprays screening a red brick suburban garden boundary

How To 17 July 2026 14 min read

Western Red Cedar Hedge: The Leylandii Fix

Western red cedar (Thuja plicata) grows 30 to 40cm a year, smells of pineapple when clipped, and unlike leylandii it regrows from bare brown wood.

Hardwood Cuttings: The Slit Trench That Roots

How To 16 July 2026 13 min read

Hardwood Cuttings: The Slit Trench That Roots

Hardwood cuttings step by step: the leaf-fall window, the slit trench method, the bud-rubbing trick for currants, and species rooting rates from UK trials.

A tray of finished wildflower seed bombs drying on cardboard, made with the 5:3:1 compost, clay and seed recipe

How To 16 July 2026 15 min read

How to Make Seed Bombs: The 5:3:1 Recipe

How to make seed bombs that actually germinate: the 5:3:1 clay recipe, real drying times, which UK native mixes work, and where you must never throw them.

Semi-Ripe Cuttings: The Bend Test That Times It

How To 16 July 2026 13 min read

Semi-Ripe Cuttings: The Bend Test That Times It

UK guide to Semi-Ripe Cuttings: The Bend Test That Times It, with timing, setup, care, common problems and useful next steps for British gardens.

Hands harvesting ripe scarlet Rosa rugosa hips from a hedge in a UK coastal garden in late autumn

How To 15 July 2026 15 min read

Roses from Seed: Why Yours Won't Be Peace

How to grow roses from seed in the UK: harvesting hips, cold stratification at 4-6C, real germination rates and why seedlings never come true.

A caddy of spent coffee grounds being tipped onto a compost heap in a UK back garden

How To 13 July 2026 13 min read

Coffee Grounds in the Garden: The Truth

Practical UK guidance on Coffee Grounds in the Garden: The Truth, covering timing, suitable conditions, setup, ongoing care, common problems and useful.

Bowl of white paperwhite narcissi flowering indoors on a bright windowsill in a UK home at Christmas

How To 13 July 2026 13 min read

Grow Paperwhites Indoors for Christmas

How to grow paperwhite narcissi indoors for Christmas. No chilling needed, flowering in 4-6 weeks. Potting, timing and the anti-flop alcohol trick.

Finished EPDM-lined wildlife pond with planted marginal shelf and a pebble beach in a UK garden

How To 13 July 2026 15 min read

How to Install a Pond Liner Step by Step

Install a pond liner in a UK garden by calculating the size, digging shelves, adding protective underlay, placing the liner and finishing a secure edge.

A living willow dome woven from green withies standing on a mown lawn in a UK garden

How To 13 July 2026 13 min read

How to Build a Living Willow Dome

Practical UK guidance on How to Build a Living Willow Dome, covering timing, suitable conditions, setup, ongoing care, common problems and useful checks.

Gardener replanting a divided clump of snowdrops in leaf into damp soil under a bare deciduous tree in a UK garden

How To 13 July 2026 13 min read

Planting Bulbs 'In the Green' Explained

Plant snowdrops and bluebells in the green after flowering, with guidance on lifting, dividing, replanting, watering and aftercare.

Pollarding and Coppicing Made Simple

How To 13 July 2026 15 min read

Pollarding and Coppicing Made Simple

Practical UK guidance on Pollarding and Coppicing Made Simple, covering timing, suitable conditions, setup, ongoing care, common problems and useful.

Large protected oak tree with a Tree Preservation Order in the front garden of a UK suburban semi-detached house

How To 13 July 2026 14 min read

Tree Preservation Orders: What You Can Do

Tree Preservation Orders explained for UK homeowners: restrictions, how to check for a TPO, the eight-week consent process and fines up to £20,000.

Avocado grown from stone sprouting a green shoot on a suburban UK kitchen windowsill

How To 9 July 2026 14 min read

Grow Avocado From Stone: 8-Step UK Guide

Grow avocado from stone the reliable way: sprout the pit in water in 2-8 weeks, pot it on, pinch for a bushy plant, and keep it alive over winter.

Watering can feeding a vegetable bed with diluted homemade fish fertiliser in a UK garden

How To 9 July 2026 14 min read

Homemade Fish Fertiliser: Free Feed From Scraps

Homemade fish fertiliser recipe for UK gardens: ferment fish scraps with sugar for 4-6 weeks, strain, dilute 1:20 and feed leafy crops for free.

Naturalising bulbs in grass: drifts of wild daffodils flowering in long orchard grass under bare apple trees in spring

How To 9 July 2026 15 min read

Naturalising Bulbs in Grass: 6 That Thrive

Naturalising bulbs in grass: the best daffodils, crocus and camassia, correct planting depth, the throw-and-plant method and the six-week mowing rule.

Full index

All guides A–Z