Preparing your Garden for Spring

Autumn is the wind-down season when it comes to gardening. However, that doesn’t mean there isn’t things to do in your garden to prepare it for the colder months. Here we share some tips on how to care for a few plants and vegetables in your garden, however be sure to act quickly, before the snows and frost come.

Out With The Old…

Heavy dew on autumnal nights encourages rot and botrytis which can eat away at your plants. Dead head any dahlias to prevent botrytis attacking blooms that have not come yet (this way you will get autumn flowerings). Equally, thin autumn lettuce to prevent the spread of botrytis. If you have any courgettes, pull dead flowers off them as they can damage the fruit under the damp leaf canopy. If the weather is dry, to water your pumpkins just so you get the last of them before harvesting.

Now that the sun is no longer heating your garden, tomatoes are prone to fungal attacks. Pick them daily so that the unripe ones get a chance to ripen up. Another trick is to make sure to remove at least half the foliage on the plants. This allows good airflow and as much sun to fall on the fruit as possible. Towards the end of the month you can remove complete trusses and ripen the fruit on the vine, on the greenhouse staging, or on a sunny windowsill.

Plants can rust, especially zonal pelargoniums. To avoid this, move them from damp areas to ones that are brighter and more warmer. Spray any rust affected plants with a systematic fungicide. To keep up general hygiene I will also remove and dispose of any foliage that has fallen into the pots, and re-pot every year to avoid any build-up of the spores in the ground.

If you took any cuttings over the July/August period, these should have rooted nicely by the start of autumn. Prioritise any new cuttings before it gets too cold by using a loam-based compost with the addition of perlite to keep the soil free-draining and leaving them in an airy cold frame. Water on the light side to avoid rot.

With autumn moisture, the time could not be better for growing lawns and meadows. Rake weed-free topsoil into any bare patches after scarifying a scruffy lawn, and over-sow now to green up areas that are looking tatty before winter.

…And In With The New
By preparing for spring in autumn, you avoid your garden looking tatty for those first few weeks of spring. Sowing a number of plants in Autumn and scattering them throughout the garden will bring some lovely colour in early spring and the plants, because they were sown early, gow bigger and more robust with brighter flowers and a longer lifespan. Autumn seeds germinate before winter and so, when going into semi-hibernation and above ground growth halts, growth under the soil continues, giving long roots.
We recommend certain plants for your Autumn sowing, but don’t be afraid if you have a preference:

• Ammi majus (flowering mid-may)
• Indian Prince (early may)
• Eschscholzia californica (mid may, re-sows itself)
• Purpurascens (the whole of spring)
• Centaurea cyanus (mid may)
• Euphorbia oblongata (April, then throughout the year)
• Orlaya grandiflora (mid may)
• Salvia viridis (May to September)
• Scabiosa atropurpurea (May to December)