March 2025 Planting Guide and Garden Update
Wow – where did last week go? I didn’t get much admin work done. I didn’t spend any time working in the garden. I did zero garden consults or anything work related really. But somehow the week flew by. I’d love to say I spent it lounging on the beach, or reading books, but I didn’t even do that. It just vanished into a black hole of nothingness.
Oh wait, now I remember. Watering. I’ve been bloody watering all week, trying to keep my trees alive.
I hate the cluttered feeling hoses provoke in me when they’re lying around the garden. But it feels like they’re becoming a permanent garden feature. Blue and green snakes basking in the sun, just waiting to trip me up. Like a giant bowl of UV-stabilised hollow spaghetti, the hoses connect to taps that supply water from various sources to my thirsty, wind-ravaged trees and plants.
I use standard 12 mm garden hoses for watering precious or sensitive plants. These hoses deliver fresh water, either the last remaining puddles in the rainwater tanks, or mains water. This water is so precious that I dare not waste a drop. Then there are the heavier hoses, 18 mm in diameter. Combined with the mother of all pumps, these heavy-duty hoses deliver a torrent of bore water. I can run three of them at a time and still maintain fantastic water pressure and flow rate. Last week, in one single session of power irrigation, I dumped approximately 20,000 litres of water onto the ground in less than three hours – that’s a lot of water!
But, I hear you ask, surely you have an irrigation system to take care of the watering? And you’d be right. I do have an irrigation system. It’s a fully automatic, wi-fi enabled, solenoid controlled drip system that can adjust the watering based on recent weather observations and the forecast. I couldn’t manage a garden of this scale without it. Running in the background, my irrigation system has done a wonderful job of keeping my productive garden thriving. Most of the ornamental garden beds around the house are also protected from the dry by this system. Other than checking for leaks and monitoring tank levels, irrigation is largely a set and forget affair in my garden.
But last week I needed to turn my attention to the large established trees on the property. At that point, many of these trees had never received a single drop of water from me in our six years here. They’re resilient, they’re established and they get by on what falls from the sky alone. Having an irrigation system under these trees would be a waste of time and money. Plus, it’s just more infrastructure to get in the way of things. But last week, the ornamental pears started to change colour, their upper leaves wilting in the heat.
For the first summer in my time on this property, many of my established trees are extremely drought stressed. Even if the autumn break is a long time coming, they’ll probably survive the summer. But I’m not inclined to take the chance that they don’t. We’re fortunate to have a reliable supply of water and I’m not afraid to use it. I flooded the ground under the trees with torrents of bore water. The trees perked up within 24 hours of the deluge and I’ll continue to monitor them closely.
Some of our normally bulletproof pittosporum hedges received a similar drink, as did the roses and other shrubs that have never needed my support. It highlights just how hot and windy this summer has been.
What else can be done to support my drought stressed plants?
A vegetable patch needs to be watered regularly. My vegetable patch irrigation activates in short bursts several times per day to keep the soil moisture as consistent as possible (more on irrigating the vegetable patch here). But when it comes to fruit trees, they are better off with a good deep soaking every week or fortnight.
Surviving drought stress is not just about keeping the water up to your plants. If water is scarce at your place, there are a few other tricks you can use to help nurse trees through these tough times:
Mulching, mulching, mulching. Adding a thick layer of mulch can help to retain soil moisture. Of course, there’s no point adding it to already parched soil. Give the tree a good, deep drink first, and then add the mulch to help seal it in. I prefer wood chips for mulching trees (more on that here), but if things are desperate any mulch you can get your hands on will help.
The wind rather than the sun has the biggest impact on drying out soil moisture. Look for ways to set up windbreaks. Small trees can be protected with a bit of shade cloth. On larger acreages, trees standing in the middle of a paddock could be temporarily protected with a windbreak constructed from hay or straw bales.
A haircut is a great way to reduce the amount of foliage a plant has. Most of the plant’s water loss is via the leaves. Fewer leaves = less water loss. Pruning a tree is a (sometimes drastic) way to help support the tree through this tough time. Now is a great time to conduct summer pruning on your fruit trees (more on that later in this update) and it will reduce the amount of water they need to survive.
Morning dew heralds an autumnal shift
I recorded a miserly 7 mm of rainfall for February, which matched the very low expectations I outlined in my last garden update. There’s no rain in the forecast and the dry is set to continue.
For December, January and the first half of February, the days were either blisteringly hot or super windy, and often both. But towards the end of February, we had a few days where the weather was mild and the wind was absent. These conditions will become more frequent in March.
Towards the end of February the morning dews began to increase in frequency and heaviness. This is usual for this time of the year. To me, three consecutive mornings with heavy dew indicates a shift to autumn weather. Autumn is coming!
Despite the lack of rain, the atmospheric humidity is increasing (especially overnight). Keep an eye out for issues that tend to arise in these conditions:
Fungal diseases such as powdery mildew. I’m already noticing it on the leaves of the button squash and it’s just appeared on the oldest of the zucchini leaves. So far the rest of the cucurbits are unaffected. To me, powdery mildew is a sign of the change in seasons, and I don’t do anything about it. More on that here.
A jump in the population of the Fungus-Eating Ladybird (Illeis glabula) as a result of the appearance of powdery mildew. The kids and I love watching their lifecycle on the undersides of zucchini leaves.
Increased numbers of other ladybirds about now too, such as the Spotted Amber Ladybird (Hippodamia variegata). These are predators and they are eating aphids and other sap sucking pests that are flourishing with the increased humidity (more on pest and predator dynamics here). Expect to see an increase in sap suckers as the weather becomes more consistently mild. Later, as the colder weather sets in, garden pest numbers will decrease after their autumn peak.
Harlequin bugs, which are on the march again. If you have harlequin mania, you will no doubt be seeing them everywhere. Harlequins seem to disappear during hot dry spells but return when there’s a bit of humidity about. Spring and autumn are when they tend to thrive. More on dealing with harlequins here.
Cabbage White Butterfly numbers are lower than in previous years (check out the poll results in last month’s update) but they’ve been congregating in increasingly larger numbers as the autumn weather rolls around. Lock up your brassicas!
Ugh, they’re back!
Another pest that’s made a return to my garden this year is the dreaded Queensland Fruit Fly.
You may remember last autumn my despair and panic about discovering Queensland Fruit Fly in my homegrown fruit for the first time ever. Well, they’re back.
I’m not surprised they’re here. I’ve been expecting them. In fact, my only surprise is that they weren’t here much earlier, perhaps infesting my apricots in early January. But they’ve only just shown up now, in some of my plums.
Winters are cold here in Kyneton. And like most folks from the northern states, the Queensland Fruit Fly doesn’t really like the cold. It’s probably why they’ve taken so long to reappear in my orchard.
Last year I first noticed them on March 27. This year I’ve detected them much earlier (February 11), but I wonder how much of that difference is due to my extreme vigilance this year. My ever-present expectation that they would be here “soon” has had me inspecting the orchard daily.
Fortunately, the damage is limited to one tree thus far, and only around 20% of the fruit on that tree was affected. But those pesky flies will continue to breed and infect future crops, so I’ll continue to patrol. My number one aim is to prevent fruit from falling from the tree. It’s the easiest way to break the life cycle.
Any fruit that I identify as infested is cut up and placed in the freezer for 24 hours.
If you’re dealing with your own Queensland Fruit Fly infestation, here are a few control options to consider:
Net your tree with insect exclusion netting. This needs to be done before the outbreak occurs and you need to ensure no fruit is touching the netting – the flies can sting through the netting.
Practise good hygiene. Pick fruit before it falls and break the life cycle.
Use baits. Spinosad is a certified organic bait that you can spray in locations around your orchard. Be mindful that “certified organic” products can be just as harmful to beneficial bugs as synthetic products.
Use traps. There are many different types of traps available, and it’s easy to make basic DIY traps.
I’m just beginning my journey with Queensland Fruit Fly, but reader Eileen has been successfully managing it for years and she kindly agreed to share her wisdom with Leaf Root & Fruit readers. Read her account here.
Purple eggs, plums and the three Gs
March is a time of abundance in my garden. I’m currently in peak plum season. The kids are loving tasting the different varieties of plums we grow. They’re also thrilled to be making daily excursions to the citrus grove in search of ‘purple eggs’. We love passionfruit in our family, and right now we have a glut of them. My passion project has been successful! More on how I managed to do the impossible and grow passionfruit in Kyneton here.
The early season apples are delicious this year. So crisp and juicy. We’ve been enjoying plenty of Gravenstein, Geeveston Fanny and Gala apples and have had enough to give away to friends and family. The apple bounty will continue right through to June, and even later if I can master the art of cold storing them. Read more about spreading your harvest with early, mid and late season fruit here.
The first nashis and pears should be ready any day now and I can’t wait to enjoy them.
Time is running out…
To summer prune your stone fruit trees.
Deciduous trees reverse their sap flow during autumn. They draw sap and nutrients from their leaves back down into the branches, trunk and roots of the plant. Pruning a tree when the sap flow is running towards the ground can “suck” pathogens such as bacteria and fungi into the tree’s vascular system. This is something you want to avoid because it increases the likelihood of disease.
As soon as you see colour change on tree leaves, you know that the reversal of sap flow has already begun. At this point it’s too late to prune. You are better waiting until the tree breaks dormancy in spring. That way, the wounds will quickly heal and your tree should remain healthy.
This advice is especially important for apricot and cherry trees. They’re very susceptible to diseases introduced via pruning cuts. Prune these trees only when they are actively growing. Avoid pruning apricots and cherries from the point of leaf colour change in autumn until bud burst in spring.
You can read more about pruning various fruit trees in my comprehensive guide.
The end of the planting season
Warm temperate growers (including readers in Melbourne), it's time to get planting winter vegetables. Check out my autumn planting guide for more information on growing winter vegetables.
Cool temperate folks like me, your time is nearly up. Our growing season is much shorter here in central Victoria. The cold winters require brassica crops to be well established before the end of March. You might still be able to squeeze in a few last-minute crops of broccoli or cauliflower (just remember to protect them from Cabbage White Butterfly with netting), but if the cold sets in early they’ll struggle.
In my February garden update, I discussed my three successive crops of brassicas. Crop one is booming. I should see some broccoli heads beginning to develop any day now. Crop two suffered from some sporadic germination in the hot weather. But I have back-up seedlings growing in Hiko cells in the greenhouse to transplant into any gaps. I’ll be sowing brassica crop three later this week.
After planting brassica crop three, I’ll focus on planting my broad beans and garlic and then relax knowing that the planting season is over for another year.
Bruce’s bulbs provide an opportunity to experiment
Our family doesn’t eat much garlic, but I like to grow it so we have a bit on hand. I add cloves to some of my passata, and use it in my cucumber pickles. Plus, it is such an easy crop to grow.
I grow a hard neck garlic, but I have no idea what variety it is. It’s normally quite resilient, but the last two years it has suffered from rust. This is a fungal disease that is exacerbated by high humidity. The fungus hampers the growth of the plant, and it can reduce yields. Despite the rust outbreaks, I’ve still managed to harvest decent crops.
To manage this disease, folks will often advocate for sourcing new, disease-free cloves to plant, and avoid planting where affected crops have grown in the past. But I’m not convinced. So last year I planted garlic saved from the rust-affected plants. The rust returned, but I’m not sure if it was the high rainfall in spring that influenced this. Would planting disease-free cloves have resulted in the same outcome?
So this year I’m trying something else. My neighbour Bruce grows wonderful garlic crops just 200 metres from where mine have succumbed to rust. He’s kindly offered me some of his garlic to grow alongside mine. I’m intrigued to see what will happen:
Will the rust spread from mine to his? That would tell me I’d need to avoid planting infected crops again and source disease-free garlic to plant in future years.
Will the plants grown from my garlic succumb, but plants grown from his stay resistant? Genetics are the key to avoiding many diseases, and avoiding rust in garlic is possibly no different.
Will the spring remain dry and both crops remain rust free? This would indicate that environmental conditions have the biggest impact.
Isolated in his own garden, but growing in similar environmental conditions to my crops, will Bruce’s plants remain disease free?
The answer to these questions will help me to better understand and manage the rust fungus. I’ll report back to you next spring – stay tuned.
In the meantime, keep an eye out for my guide to planting garlic. I’ll be sending it to all subscribers next week.
My to-do list for March
Until it rains, I’ll continue to wrestle hoses. I’ll also be busy in early March planting broad beans and garlic crops. Here are a few of the other tasks I’ll be doing in March:
Picking boxes of apples, pears and nashi. I’ll dry some of the apples because the kids love them, but otherwise I’m not going to be doing much in the way of preserving this year – I still have plenty left in store from last year. Any excess fruit will be given away or composted. I’ll continue my summer pruning regime once each tree has been harvested.
I gave the basil a severe haircut in mid-February and turned it into pesto. The plants are now bouncing back with a second flush of growth that will be pesto bound in around a fortnight.
I’ll make daily patrols of the orchard to help control my Queensland Fruit Fly outbreak. I’m specifically looking for ripening fruit to pick before it falls to the ground. I’m also looking for tell-tale sting holes in fruit that indicate the presence of the maggots. Any infested fruit is frozen and then fed to the chickens.
As summer crops such as sweet corn finish, I’ll remove them and plant green manure crops in their place. This helps to improve the soil and support a healthy soil food web over the winter. I’ll be using a mix of lupins, broad beans, peas, mustard greens and any other spare seeds that I have lying around.
March is peak European wasp season. I’ve noticed a few wasps about already, and their numbers tend to explode in March. They hassle the beehives as the bees are preparing their stores for winter. The aggressive wasps can also affect native insect populations. When I locate a wasp nest, I don my bee suit, grab a shovel or mattock and make nocturnal assaults to destroy the colony.
Towards the end of the month, I’ll make my first batch of passata. I’m going to make a few batches this autumn so that I have enough to last our family for two years. That will ensure I won’t need to grow saucing tomatoes next summer and will avoid all the work, water and growing space associated with it.
What to plant in March
With the onset of autumn, planting options change. I prefer growing vegetables over winter to growing summer edibles. Winter vegetables require less care and attention.
Traditionally, winter vegetable seedlings (and sweet peas) are planted out in Melbourne on or around St Patrick’s Day (17 March). In Melbourne, I’d wait another month after that.
I've put together a very detailed planting guide for autumn on my website. It has plenty of advice on selecting seedlings to plant and how to grow them. It’s most important that when you select brassica seedlings, such as broccoli and cauliflower, you choose the youngest seedlings. More on why in this post.
The Vegetable Patch from Scratch series is popular with both novice and seasoned gardeners alike. It covers everything you might want to know about growing vegetables. It might save you a bit of time and frustration by steering you away from preventable crop failures.
My planting guide generally refers to vegetables planted in the garden (as opposed to a greenhouse). This planting may consist of seeds directly sown (my usual and preferred method) or plants transplanted as seedlings. Read more about using this guide here.
If you're short on time and want less detail, here's a quick guide to some of the things you could consider planting this month in a warm temperate climate like Melbourne’s.
You can start a herb garden almost any time of the year. Try growing the following and save yourself a heap of money you’d otherwise spend on those over-packaged bunches of herbs at the supermarket:
Thyme
Sage
Parsley
Mint
Rosemary
Coriander
Chives
Oregano
Spring onions
Leafy greens will grow well in the garden now. Consider allocating space to these quick growing, very productive plants and start getting ready for lots of home-grown salads in six to eight weeks.
Lettuce
Spinach
Rocket
Endive
Silverbeet
Mustard greens
Chervil
The following root vegetables can be planted in March:
Radishes
Parsnips
Beetroot
Turnips
Onions
Garlic
Leeks
Most fruiting crops are grown over the summer. The exceptions are the following:
Broad beans
Winter brassica crops
It’s now time to start planning your winter vegetable crops, such as:
They'll germinate quickly from seed. Just be aware that the dreaded Cabbage White Butterfly tends to ruin any unprotected early crops. Hence, plan ahead and have some insect netting ready to protect them. Or better still, just wait until late April to plant out seedlings. The Cabbage White Butterfly is less prevalent in the cooler weather and your young seedlings will stand a better chance of surviving. Please read my blog post for more details on planting out your winter vegetables.
Please forward this email on to any of your friends or family who might find this planting guide helpful.
Good luck and happy gardening!
Duncan
A great update. I’m particularly interested in the outcome of your garlic experiment and eagerly await your guide to growing same.
A very interesting read. I just wondered if the following was a typo:
" Traditionally, winter vegetable seedlings (and sweet peas) are planted out in Melbourne on or around St Patrick’s Day (17 March). In Melbourne, I’d wait another month after that."
Should it be "Outside of Melbourne" you'd wait another month?
Cheer