Avoid late frost damage to peaches, nectarines and apricots by covering them with fleece on cold nights. Any protective coverings used against peach leaf curl should be removed by the end of the month (in all but the coldest areas) to allow access by pollinating insects.

Before buds break, remove winter protection from wall-trained figs and prune back older stems to the main trunk or the base to encourage new shoots.

Keep wall-trained fruit, especially stone fruit, well watered during fruit set and fruit development. Use rainwater or recycled water wherever possible.

Mulching fruit crops will help them to retain moisture around the roots.

Hoe off or pull out raspberry suckers appearing between rows. Very vigorous plants may also need some selective cane removal, so that there will be sufficient air and light penetration between the branches, and to ensure the plant has enough energy to ripen all the young fruits.

Net soft fruits as they begin to ripen.

Plant out seedlings of alpine strawberries.

Shorten leaders and side shoots on over-vigorous wall-trained apples and pears, to weaken their growth and so divert their energy to fruit production rather than shoot growth.

On indoor vines allow only one flower truss to develop on each main lateral coming off the central rod; any others should be removed. Keep flowering laterals short, pinching out their tips of at two leaves past the single flower truss. Non-fruiting laterals can be kept a bit longer, pinching out the tips after five leaves have formed. Any side shoots branching off the main laterals should be stopped at one leaf.

Wall-trained plums and cherries can be pruned this month, as long as the weather is warm enough for them to be in full, active growth. If pruned while still dormant, they run the risk of getting silver leaf disease. Any branches coming out from the wall should be removed entirely.

For wall-trained sweet cherries, pinch out the growing tip of each branch, once it has grown six new leaves. After fruit picking, the shoots can be cut back again, removing half of this year’s new growth, and removing any overcrowded or unhealthy looking stems at the same time.

For wall-trained ‘Morello’ and acid cherries, prune out entirely any fruited shoots, removing all of this year’s new growth. But be careful not to remove any unfruited new shoots, as it is these that will produce fruit next year. Instead, tie them in so that they are easy to pick the following year.

Remove strawberry runners before they start to creep along the ground. Leaving them will only sap energy from existing plants, so reducing their yield of fruit. If you need runners in order to have new plants for next year, then pinch off the flowers from a couple of selected plants, encouraging them to produce green shoots and runners (rather than fruits and flowers), which you can save and pot up separately.

Any early strawberry crops that were kept under glass or under fleece and cloches, should now be uncovered (or the greenhouse doors opened fully), to allow access for pollinating insects.

Control weeds to prevent them competing for moisture and nutrients. Hoe regularly between rows on hot days to make sure the weeds dry up and die.

Over-vigorous apple and pear trees can be ring-barked. Heavy crops of blossom can also be thinned, to reduce the numbers of fruits that form with the aim of encouraging more even ripening, better fruit quality, and reduce problems with biennial bearing.

Gooseberry blossom may also be thinned in order to produce a smaller number of large dessert fruits.

Pest & disease watch

Stay alert for gooseberry sawfly damage and the raised red blisters of currant blister aphid.

Dead shoots on tree fruit may indicate a number of disease problems. Check for signs of apple and pear canker, bacterial canker and blossom wilt.

Hang pheromone traps in apple trees to help reduce codling moth numbers. This is the month when they start to mate, so trapping them will reduce the numbers of eggs. You will need one trap for every three to five trees.

Ensure good air circulation in the greenhouse to reduce risk of Botrytis, powdery mildew and downy mildew on grapes.

Do not be overly worried if the leaves on your pear tree start to come up in small pale blisters. This is probably due to the pear leaf blister mite. Although there are no effective pesticides available to amateur gardeners, the damage is not as severe as the plant's appearance may suggest. Infested trees can still produce a good crop of pears.

Reduce numbers of rotten strawberries by tucking straw mulch, strawberry matting or similar around the plants, to prevent the fruits from touching the soil or getting too damp. Covering the whole bed with netting will also reduce bird damage.

Never spray pesticides once blossom has opened on fruit crops. They will kill the pollinating insects that you rely on for your crops. When carrying out any spraying operation, take care to spray early in the morning when fewer pollinating insects are about - you only need to kill the pests, not the beneficial insects.

Keep an eye out for early aphid attacks, and deal with them appropriately, either by squashing small colonies, or by using pesticides on larger infestations. Remember that very few pesticides have approval for use on edible crops. Derris and pyrethrum are often good choices, but always check the label first for confirmation of approval, safety and effectiveness.

American gooseberry mildew can appear as a brown crust over the leaves and fruits of gooseberry bushes. Spraying with fungicides containing sulphur or myclobutanil is usually effective, but you may wish to grow a more resistant variety like ‘Invicta’.

Apples and pears may need spraying against scab, where this has got out of hand in previous years. Fungicides containing mancozeb or myclobutanil are suitable choices.

Look out for powdery mildew, especially during warm dry spells.

Keep watch for signs of cane spot or spur blight on blackberries and hybrid berries. Ensure that any fungicides used have approval for use on edible crops. Sulphur, myclobutanil and mancozeb are often good choices, but always read the label to check for approval, safety and effectiveness before using.

Blackcurrants are vulnerable to big bud mite (affected buds appear larger than normal). The mites can spread blackcurrant reversion virus. Virus symptoms will be evident once the plant comes into flower, as the flowers look red rather than grey. Affected plants must be dug up and disposed of in the rubbish, or by burning. You may wish to grow resistant varieties such as ‘Farleigh’, ‘Foxendown’ or ‘Ben Hope’.

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