Spring is easing into a ready to be sprung position and the propagators among you will be looking forward to getting those cuttings that you were eyeing up last year off their parent plant and into your garden (having asked their rightful owner first, of course…).

Eeek! Here we are trying to come across all professional and wise and we plain forgot to mention autumn  fruiting raspberry canes in our newsletter this month (which is having trouble at the moment, like the rest of our site – bit of a nightmare, actually).

So, the point was: if you have autumn fruiting raspberry canes, prune them down to the ground now to get a good crop later this year.

At Ashridge Trees HQ, we have a very advanced system for logging all the queries that come in from our customers. Her name is Frances and we’d be in deep trouble without her, so please be nice to her when you give us a call.

One question that she’s heard a few times is about which of the three famous laurel bushes to use in a particular site. Cherry or Common Laurel, Portugal Laurel and Bay Laurel will all do well in shady spots, although Bay Laurel won’t be happy in very deep shade.

Another hawthorn tip for those of you who planted your quickthorn (same as hawthorn) whips last year.  Hopefully you followed our instructions and cut each plant back by half when you planted it.  Equally hopefully, they all survived the weird winter last year and the very dry April.  (Second dry spring in a row for those who are counting).

Tags: Hawthorn, Hedging