Jobs for June/July

Hopefully after enjoying midsummer, here’s a few jobs to start getting on with over the next month;

Fruit, Vegetables and flowers

• Start sowings of late season/autumn vegetables such, kale, lettuce, fennel, spinach, radicchio, winter radish, chard, beetroot and carrots. Sow them in plugs to get them going if your plot is full, keep them moist and out of direct sunlight.

• Fruit - Apples - if fruit is starting to form, start thinning fruit to get a quality crop, net berry crops to limit bird and child theft!

• If your tomatoes have set fruit, start feeding them with a high potash feed, I use comfrey tea, pinch out side shoots and the tops when you have 4/5 trusses of tomatoes

• Keep harvesting vegetables and flowers

• Perennial geraniums, after flowering cut them back to the ground as this will encourage a second flush of flower

• Regularly hoe of weeds and nightwatch for slugs

• Start marking plants that you want to collect seed from later in the year

• Dead head roses and perennials to encourage flowering

• Regularly water and feed pots and containers, liquid seaweed is ideal.

Hedges:

• Clip box hedging/topiary, try to avoid damp days to limit the spread of fungal disease and disinfect your tools

• Hedges – you can start cutting these mid july – but check for any birds nests before you do.

• Leave yew hedging/topiary until later in the year

Meadows

• Start cutting down meadow areas, this can be done anytime after midsummer, try to do it bit by bit so there is always some habitat for wildlife. Aim to allow wildflowers to set seed before you cut. Make sure you clear away the arisings to enable plants to regrow and avoid adding nutrients to the soil. Collect some seed and try growing a few in trays and pots to add to your meadow.

Compost

• Turn compost so its ready for autumn/winter spreading.

• You will likely be collecting lots of green material such as grass and hedge clippings, be sure to add brown material such as woodchip, cardboard or paper to keep a balanced mixed that composts well. Too much green material will go wet and slimey.