February Gardening To Do List

• Fertilize trees and shrubs with Nitro Phos Tree and Shrub fertilizer. Except azaleas. Feed them after they bloom with Nitro Phos Azalea Camellia Food
• If you have pecan trees start feeding them now.
• Apply a pre-emergent weed killer like Nitro Phos Barricade for those not yet seen
• Spot treat those visible weeds with Nitro Phos Weed Beater Ultra or us Weed Beater Complete for both seen and unseen weeds.
• It is OK to go ahead and prune your crepe myrtles.  There are many different ways to prune them. A good rule of thumb is not to prune anything larger than a pencil.
• Now would be a good time to use a systemic insect killer on your crepe myrtles to help keep away those insects that cause that ugly black sooty mold later in the spring.
• Apply a good lawn fertilizer such as Nitro Phos Imperial 15-5-10
• Valentines day is the time to prune your roses. If you have hybrid tea or florabunda roses, do not prune them back any shorter than 18 inches. Make all cuts ¼ to ½ inch above the outward facing buds. Do not prune climbing and antique roses until after their bloom cycle. Shrub roses such as the Knockout can be sheared back to any desirable height.
• Cut back all your perennials but proceed with caution. Tender perennials can be killed if pruned too far back into the green wood and hit by a hard freeze.
• It is ok to fertilize all your perennials at this time. We recommend Nelson’s Color Star.
• All roses should be fed right now with a good quality rose food. We use Nelson’s Color Star on all of ours with great results.
• Apply dormant oil sprays to scale prone plants.
• If you want to make your ground covers spread faster in March and April, go ahead an trim them up now.
• DO NOT TRIM AZALEAS RIGHT NOW. You will cut off all the blooms. Many other flowering shrubs also have their flower buds set so the same thing could happen.