August Garden Jobs

The Flower Garden

• – Keep everything well watered especially Camellias and Rhododendrons to promote development of buds for next year.
• – Stake any flowers that are overly tall or heavier at the top to keep them safe from wind damage.
• – Dead head lilies, perennials and bedding plants to help with longer a flowering period and next year’s growth.
• – Prune wisteria and summer flowering shrubs once they have flowered.
• – Prune rambling and climbing roses after they flower.
• – Collect seeds and store them appropriately to plant them out next year.

The Kitchen Garden

• – Harvest beans. Both French and Runner beans need to be picked early and often. This will prevent them from going to seed, stop them from becoming stringy and also encourage a second growth.
• – Add a high potash feed like Tomorite to pepper, cucumber and aubergine plants when you see the first fruits.
• – Water and harvest sweetcorn; harvest when milky juices come out of a corn if you pop it.
• – Trim herb plants; cutting back old growth will allow a second growth that can be harvested before the cold weather sets in!

The Fruit Garden

• – Feed citrus plants with a specialised feed or fertiliser.
• – Give any container foods a high potash feed such as Tomorite.
• – Protect your precious crops from birds with a netting over your fruit.
• – Begin harvesting fruit trees such as plums, apricots, peaches and cherries.
• – Remove mulching from around strawberry plants to avoid the spread of disease and plant out any rooted Strawberry runners for next year.
• – Blackcurrant bushes need to be pruned after all of the fruits have been harvested. Only prune the stems that fruited this year.