DOWN TO EARTH: Successful summer garden

SOL MORGAN, GROWISE CONSULTANCY

So far this summer has been great for many food and flowering crops, with periods of fine weather and some rain to keep the soil somewhat moist. But let’s not rest on our laurels. There is still plenty to do to ensure a good harvest and a successful summer season.

Vegetable garden

Keeping up the early morning watering along with regular weekly liquid fertilising will help keep vegetable crops growing and producing. Most fruiting veggies benefit from a dose of comfrey juice or even just weed juice to keep them producing fruit. The same goes for ongoing harvesting. You know what happens if you miss a zucchini or two: a marrow. Beans if left unharvested will develop their seed inside their pods. So, stay vigilant in harvesting.

Main crop potatoes will be ready soon. Make sure they are well mulched, or exposed potatoes will go green, making them unpalatable. In fact, a well-mulched garden will conserve soil moisture and limit weed proliferation.

February is the last month to plant winter crops like Brassicas (cabbage, cauliflower, and Brussels sprouts). Broccoli can also be planted a bit later in March. These crops like soil with good amounts of compost, rotted manure or blood and bone. Add lime and/or dolomite – between 100-200 grams per square metre – for best results. Ideally find a shady bed or cover with shade cloth. Plant seedlings deep, up to bottom leaves, and water well.

Harvest and store summer crops like onions after drying well. Harvest early pumpkins such as butternut when stalk is brown. Use secateurs so there is a good stalk and store in a cool, dry, rodent-free place.

Orchard

Some fruit trees will have finished producing and hopefully you have managed to harvest, eat, or preserve some of the fruit for later in the year. Those still growing fruit may need additions of water to boost fruit size. Mulching helps too. Fully laden trees may need support. While it is still summer, it is a good time to prune summer fruit, especially stone fruit. Remove older hanging branches along with those taking up the centre, leaving a nice vase shape.

Flowers

Prune summer flowering perennials like roses to encourage late flowering. Keep planting annual flowers like calendula, alyssum, carnations, hollyhocks, pansy and sweet peas for winter and spring flowering. Save seed from spring-planted flowers like nemesia or let them self-seed and transplant later when they re-emerge.

Enjoy the harvest and rest of summer with friends and family.

SOL’S GARDEN JOBS FOR FEBRUARY

Vegetable care

Sow green crops in spare beds. Thin winter carrots and mound a little. Spread coffee grounds to deter carrot rust fly.

Continue spraying Bt on Brassicas to manage caterpillar damage.

Continue to delateral and train tomatoes and cucumbers. Harvest sweetcorn when tassels brown. Harvest shellout beans and hang dry. Lift kumara runners over themselves to stop them rooting. Stake and tie up crops to save for seed, eg coriander. Look for shield bugs and feed to chooks.

Hothouse: Sow winter crops like broccoli and spinach beet into punnets/trays. Replace yellow sticky cards for whitefly control or buy Enforce. Keep well ventilated. Spray with garlic and pyrethrum vs aphids.

For transplanting: All seeds 4-5 February. Leafy greens (spinach, spinach beet, silverbeet/chard, lettuce, endive, cabbages), cauliflower and broccoli (also 14-15 Feb). Herbs and flowers, eg snapdragon (3 and 13 Feb).

Sow direct: All seeds 4-5 February. Mesclun salad and spring onions (also 14-15 Feb). Late French beans (also 7-8 and 17 Feb). Radish, carrots, beetroot, kohlrabi, turnip, swede (also 9-12 Feb). Flowers, eg Iceland poppy (3 and 13 Feb).

Plant: Best 1 and 18-28 Feb. Salad greens, silverbeet, spinach, cabbages, broccoli, cauliflower, celery, late zucchini, and leeks. Flowers, eg spring bulbs.

Herb care

Sow herb seed directly, eg parsley.

Plant herbs like late basil indoors or under cover.

Weed and mulch.

Harvest herbs for drying.

Harvest coriander seeds for cooking and others for seed.

Fruit care

Net fruit for bird protection, eg figs.

Prune grapes to six leaves past the fruits and remove laterals.

Chop down greenery around trees for mulch and airflow.

Prune citrus when harvesting. Wind-protect young plants.

Spray with mineral/neem oil for scale insect, etc.

Spray garlic and pyrethrum with neem oil on fruits like apples vs woolly apple aphid.

Insert trichodowels (vinevax) vs silverleaf fungus, particularly in stone fruit.

Wrap cardboard and/or paste fruit tree trunks to trap moth larvae. Feed codling moth-infested fruit to chickens or pigs.

General garden care

Compost as you weed garden.

Cut comfrey regularly and fill LF drum.

Mulch mow lawn on high setting.

Collect seaweed/seagrass and mulch.

Prune back perennials after flowering.

Prune shelter for airflow and shred to make woody compost/mulch.