August Notes from the Studio
Garden tasks and growing flowers
What to do in August
Have you noticed the ‘turn’? I have. The turn of the year and a build up towards the orchestral finale that is September. For me, this means, the good stuff starts flowering and my favourite combinations come together.
It is August, some plants look tired, reduced a little. Work towards next year’s flowers have begun too. As ever, the gardens are a sum of many parts, each in its own unique chapter of its growing season.
Here is this month’s list of my top recommended tasks to get the best of, and enjoy your garden and growing space.
Pick flowers and dead head
Numero Uno - To keep flowers coming, keep harvesting and certainly pinch off the spent flowers to stop plants running to seed. If they do, collect the seeds (how to save and why your own saved seed is always better)
Plant out biennials
By now, June sown biennials, foxgloves, honesty, sweet williams and sweet rocket, wallflowers and daucus are large enough to prick out and transplant. I am growing them on in a nursery bed. Next month I will lift and move into final positions.
Biennials being planted out in a nursery bed. Some seedlings need growing on a little more before pricking out. Green Manures
It’s a great month to sow green manures. Either for long term, growing and cover over winter, or a shorter, over few weeks before clearing for autumn planting. These are great fast growing plants that bring nutrients up, open up the soil, add organic matter and suppress unwanted weeds. They also activate the soil biology if the ground has been bare by making food. The easiest way to great soil.
Stake late flowering perennials
Echinacea, aster and rudbeckia’s.
Cut back flower stems
Delphiniums, poppies, lupins, geraniums and other herbaceous plants that have finished flowering. Chop down spent stems and tired leaved.
Cutting back early summer perennials to lift the August border and a toppling wheelbarrow of trimmings. Feeding
Some plants, tomatoes, sweet peas and dahlias will enjoy a weekly feed, the rest of the garden will get a monthly spray of a very weak feed. I spray directly onto the leaves, in the cool of the evening. A little goes a long way. Here are my feed recipes. If you haven’t made your own feeds, I recommend this and this.
A compost tea diluted into a sprayer. Mixed to about 1/30 dilution, looks like a weak tea. Take cuttings
Of tender perennials, verbenas and pelargoniums.
Helpful Summer Reading
Watering: How to reduce the time and resource to water effectively and efficiently.
Going away? Prepare your garden and plants to return to a thriving space.
Mid Year Review - why it’s helpful to reflect on your growing (not just in the garden?) as I look towards the other half of the year.
Why your own saved seed is best (and it’s not just because it’s free. It really is better!)
How to cut and condition late summer flowers top tips on cutting flowers and how to prepare them for a long vase life with some special notes for plants such as zinnias, cosmos and dahlias.
Narcissus shopping list now is the perfect time to put in spring bulb orders. A list of all my favourites narcissus and why you should be growing them.
Harvesting
What you are picking, or aim to this time next year.
Shrubs, Trees & Climbers - Now, finally, we can start cutting the foliage! Now the leaves and stems have matured, they will conditioned to arrange with. My favourites - physocarpus, jasmine, honeysuckle, eucalyptus, beech, buddleja, continus and hydrangea.
Perennials - End of the mints and oregano, going strong, eryngium, ecinops, dianthus, verbena bonariensis, salvias, macleaya plumes, aster, persicaria, dahlias, phlox, astrantia and monarda.
Bulbs - Crocomisa, lillies, gladioli.
Annuals - Loads, all of them! chrysanthemum, corncockle, end of (my) sweet peas, calendula, cornflowers, corncockle, nicotiana, snapdragons, achillea, daucus, nasturtiums and many more.
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Great reminder for me to get my biennials sorted!
Thanks Anna, a lot noted this month