In August gardeners thoughts turn to preparing their outside spaces for Spring and Summer. Fresh shoots will be starting to emerge as the garden moves toward a new season, so here are a few tasks to help prepare your garden for the coming season when it will burst into life!
1) Seeds of Summer annuals, such as hollyhocks, cleomes, scabious, cosmos, and marigolds can be sown as the soil warms up.
2) Get to grips with some serious hard weeding, making sure you completely remove every weed as soon as you see them, and keep weeding all through the growing season. Add plenty of compost on top of new and existing beds, but don’t dig it in as this will encourage new weeds to germinate.
3) Prune established roses in the garden before new growth begins to show and mulch well. August is also the month to plant out some new roses.
4) Fertilise all trees and shrubs toward the end of August to keep them thriving and healthy. Water the fertiliser in thoroughly.
5) Grow some indigenous plants that are drought tolerant and suit the local environment. As they are fast growing they will soon look absolutely stunning! Try Osteopermums, Gazanias, Vygies and diascias. Maybe include a few wildflowers which will also attract bees, butterflies and other pollinators.
6) Summer-flowering bulbs will provide an amazing spectacle if planted in groups. Try Watsonia, ‘Bugle lily’, in a variety of colours, Ixia (African corn lily), the ever-popular, delightful Dierama, ‘Angels fishing rod’, with slender, arching stems, and the Crocosmia, some varieties of which can grow to 2m tall. Other choices could include Gladioli, Amaryllis, Canna lilies, Eucomis ‘Pineapple flower’ and Liatris.
7) In the vegetable plot, seed potatoes planted in August and September will be ready to be harvested in December. New potatoes can be harvested earlier. If space is limited in the veggie garden use potato sacks or a large bin. Beetroot, radish, carrots, bush and runner beans can be sown directly into prepared beds.