September – Harvest time !

September – Harvest time ! Now you can enjoy the fruits – and vegetables - of all your hard labours in the garden or allotment during the spring and summer. Many will now be ripe for picking if they haven’t already been harvested and enjoyed. If fruit or veg is refusing to ripen, for example tomatoes, take off excess foliage to allow more sunshine to speed up the process.

It’s been an interesting season: a hot June, a relatively cool, cloudy and wet July, followed by an average August. So often September turns out to be a warm, sunny and comfortable month. Both we and our gardens deserve it! We can then enjoy the lush green which moist conditions bring and the continual flowering of many bedding plants until cooler weather starts in October.

It's also harvest time for flowers. Dahlias should now be at their best; they make wonderful cut flowers as their strong stems make them unlikely to wilt and they should last for many days in a vase. Maybe you have some roses still in flower? Again, even a few will bring indoor cheer to any room. Remember to remove all foliage below the water line to keep the water sweet. Even then, changing the water regularly and keeping out of direct sunlight will prolong vase life.

September also brings new opportunities:

• Lawns are less stressed than normal for the time of year, but a sprinkling of grass seed on top of a thin covering of topsoil or lawn dressing will fill any bare or balding patches. -Spring bulbs can now be planted to provide an early show of colour in 2024. -If you need to weedspray, this is your final opportunity until March, as most weedkillers work best when they are actively growing.

David Hogg

Buckland Nurseries