0115 846 5113
August 2007 >>>
August is traditionally a holiday month, when the garden is abandoned for a couple of weeks and left to its own devices. But with a little planning and perhaps some occasional activity your garden doesn't have to degenerate into a wilderness. See these notes for ideas on how best to spend the time you have in the garden this month to keep it in tip-top condition.
SHRUBS AND FLOWERS
Plants that set seed tend to stop flowering as soon as the seed pods are mature. The way we gardeners fool the plant to produce more flowers is to take off all faded blooms and seed heads. While you are dead-heading your flowering bedding plants, perennials and roses look out for infestations of pest and diseases. To treat both problems carry a RoseClear Gun! for instant action. The spray will clear any populations of aphids and give good control of the three major plant diseases, powdery mildew, blackspot and rust.
Before you go on holiday take some cuttings of geraniums, pelargoniums, fuchsias, osteospermums, penstemons and other non-hardy garden plants. Short stems that have been cut cleanly with a sharp knife are best prepared by the removal of the lower leaves and dipping the base in a hormone rooting powder. They will tend to root much easier in August, especially if given a moist atmosphere around the leaves. Fill some pots with Levington Multi-Purpose Compost and push your prepared cutting around the edge of the pot. Put the pot in a clear plastic bag, leaving the top loosely open. This will encourage a moist atmosphere without encouraging rots.
For late summer colour the mallow bush (Lavetera) is hard to beat. The pink profusion of flowers makes a great display throughout August and on into the autumn.
A general feed all around the garden with Miracle-Gro's new Liquafeed will ensure that your garden continues to flower throughout the summer. It can be used for just plain watering through three different spray patterns of shower, wide and distance or you can screw a bottle of concentrate liquid plant food into the back so that the water through your hosepipe automatically dilutes the feed to provide balanced nutrients and trace elements to encourage strong new growth and flowering potential.
Plant out winter-flowering pansies as soon as the seedlings are large enough to move. To clean the soil before planting out, treat the annual weeds with Weedol 2 or Weedol 2 Gun!
Michaelmas daisies will be growing vigorously ready to burst into bloom. Check them regularly for signs of powdery mildew and treat at the first signs of disease with either FungusClear mixed in you own pressure sprayer or buy a ready-to-use FungusClear Gun! These fungicide products contain a systemic ingredient that gets inside the leaf to give protection and control of this crippling disease.
PATIO GARDENING
Dead-heading flowers in pots, tubs and hanging baskets not only keeps them looking tidy, but also encourages more flowers because you remove any potential seed heads at the same time. Some annual flowers such as petunia and busy lizzies rarely set seed, but others are prolific. It pays to dead-head all of them and to feed them on a regular basis. Unless you have used a premium compost such as Moisture Control Compost from Miracle-Gro your plants will soon use up the nutrients in the compost. Supplementary feeding with either traditional blue crystals of Miracle-Gro Plant Food dissolved in a watering can will work wonders if applied every week or you can let your hosepipe do the dilution and application if you fit and use a Liquafeed device on the end of the hose.
Tap water through a hose is fine for most ordinary plants, but for rhododendrons, azaleas and other ericaceous plants grown in pots and tubs such as pieris and camellia then soft rain water is much better. If your tap water is alkaline and tends to fur up the element in your kettle, then you need to collect rain water and use this on your acid-loving plants. The addition of Miracle-Gro Ericaceous Plant Food to this water every fortnight will ensure your plants get the right amount of iron in their diet to grow strong dark green foliage and to thrive.
It's time to think about growing plants on to provide colour in pots and hanging baskets during autumn and winter. It's worth planting up hanging baskets early so the plants can get well established and fill out before they go on display. For long-lasting interest use a mixture of flowering and foliage plants. Dwarf Michaelmas daisies, winter pansies and polyanthus will supply the flowering colour and ornamental cabbage, grey-leaved helichrysum or variegated ivy will provide interesting leaves.
Planting up patio containers with spring bulbs such as daffodils, snowdrops and crocus and topped off with hardy flowering plants such as pansies, forget-me-nots, and polyanthus will provide colour for the next six months. If the container is large enough then some trailing foliage plants will add some interesting texture between flowerings. Gold-edged ivy, silver-leaved cineraria or purple Heuchera will add coloured foliage for year-round interest.
As these containers will be growing through the wettest time of the year they will grow best in a free-draining compost such as Miracle-Gro Eco-Sense Peat-Free Compost. If you add in a handful of Miracle-Gro Slow Release Plant Food this will ensure the plants are well fed whenever the temperatures are warm enough to stimulate plant growth. If you are growing any of the pink heathers from the Erica or Calluna family see that you plant them in a special compost for acid-loving plants. Levington Ericaceous Compost or Miracle-Gro Azalea, Camellia & Rhododendron Compost are ideal.
LAWN CARE
Cut the grass to the normal summer length just before you leave for holiday. Don't be tempted to scalp the grass. Cutting it too low will cause damage and leave patches for the easy germination of weed seeds. Unless you have persuaded a friendly neighbour to cut your grass while you are away the grass will be extra long on your return. Raise the cutting blade a notch or two for the first cut and then return to the normal height for the next trim.
In warm, dry weather grass loses about 4 gallons of water each week from every square yard of lawn.
FRUIT & VEGETABLES
Continue to pick runner beans, French beans, courgettes and other summer vegetables while they are young and tender. If you are going on holiday get a neighbour to visit to harvest all beans twice a week during your absence. Regular picking is the only way to get the plants to keep producing seed pods for the rest of the season, so make sure your neighbour is clear that this is more than just a convenient favour it's vital for your continued harvest.
While you are picking young beans, watch out for blackfly infestations on the tender new growth of runner beans and spray immediately they are seen with Nature's Answer Natural Bug Killer. Using a natural insecticide based on pyrethrins means that you don't have to miss a day of harvest as food crops are safe to pick and eat the day after treatment. If they need feeding then the Liquafeed system provides the quick and easy way to water and feed the plants for maximum growth and flavour.
Tomatoes will need side shoots removed regularly and extra feeding to provide a tasty crop of fruit for summer salads. Plants in growing bags, Giant Planters or directly in garden soil will appreciate the high potash and extra trace elements provided by a special tomato food such as Tomorite that also contains magnesium and seaweed extract. Regular applications of Tomorite will encourage a high yield of top-quality, full-flavoured tomatoes. Plants outdoors need 2 litres of dilute feed applied weekly - but growing bags under glass need to have dilute feed substituted for plain water twice a week for maximum growth.
The beginning of August is not too late to sow a number of vegetable seeds. There is still time to sow seeds of rocket, turnip, beetroot and spring onions for late autumn picking. A sowing of carrots (Early Nantes) and some perpetual spinach (spinach beet) will provide a hearty autumn crop. For spring cabbages next April sow seed of Harbinger, Offenham or Spring Hero now ready fro transplanting in October. Before sowing thinly in rows, enrich the soil by raking in Miracle-Gro Soil Improver or Levington Soil Conditioner into the top 5 cm of soil. As soon as you see the seedlings emerge sprinkle SlugClear Advanced Pellets along the rows so that slugs and snails do no ruin your plants.
Hardly any late frosts were experienced this spring to harm the set of apples, plums and pears. This means that this year should see a bumper crop of fruit in most gardens. If your plum tree is laden with fruit, you may have to thin out some of the plums or there could be a danger of the extra weight breaking branches completely.
Pick dessert gooseberries, blackberries, loganberries and other hybrid berries regularly. Depending on the availability of food elsewhere, you may need to protect these succulent berries from bird damage with suitable netting.
WEEDS
During summer those pernicious weeds, ground elder, couch grass and bindweed will have spread their roots and tried to take over more garden space. It's tempting to try to dig up the roots, but because they run for great distances, through the roots of wanted plants and deep down in the soil the chances of you getting them all out is remote. A much better plan is to use the systemic herbicide on the weed leaves. Weedkillers such as Roundup and Tumbleweed contain glyphosate that kills weeds from the inside out and right down to the deepest root. Choose a warm still day when rain is not expected and simply spray all the weed foliage you can get at easily. For large areas you can buy bottles of concentrate that you dilute in your own pressure sprayer or you can buy ready to use formulations in hand held trigger sprayers of various sizes. The active weedkilling element goes in through the leaves and gradually travels down the roots to kill the whole plant. A job this thorough takes time so you may have to wait a week or two to see the initial effects. But as you've saved yourself some back-breaking digging, just sit back and wait to see the results of a job well done. It's worth it.
ALWAYS READ THE LABEL: USE PESTICIDES SAFELY
Information supplied by the Scotts Miracle Gro Company UK Ltd
.........................................
Download PDF of Garden Diaries below: Or visit the archived pages:
