- If deadheading your rhododendrons has got away on you, at least do those which set seed. Some set so much seed that it can weaken the plant and kill it. The seed setters will usually show open seed pods from last year still hanging on looking like little wooden stars and they show no growth from that spent flower tip. These types of plants can tend to be leggy and spindly – they are putting so much energy into reproducing themselves that they forget to grow. At least try and deadhead these ones. It is not so critical to deadhead varieties which set very little seed although they do look better for your efforts.
- If you have water features, try and prevent invasive water weeds getting away on you. We have problems with water hawthorn in our stream which we extract with a rake head on the end of a long pole. Over the years, Mark has eliminated the unwanted oxygen weed (fine in fish tanks but not in waterways). And some of the water lilies can be so invasive that they cover all the water, which is a bit self defeating for a water feature. Best to get rid of the rampant ones and replace with better behaved varieties. Or thin the plant back to one crown.
- As the yellow primula heladoxa finishes flowering, deadhead it to prevent it spreading seed. This is another plant with weed potential and as it usually grown alongside water, it can spread some distance if it is a stream.
- Annuals such as asters, zinnias, snapdragons, stocks and Iceland poppies can still be started from seed and will give you good flowering in late summer and autumn.
- A bit of a typo last week when we advocated continuing successional sowing of broad beans. That should have been dwarf beans.
- Now is the important time to start getting winter vegetables into the ground, such as Brussels sprouts, celery and leeks. The seed of these will have been started some time ago to get good sized plants for you to plant out. If you want to do leeks from seed yourself, this is about as late as you leave it. Sow the seeds in situ immediately. They won’t get as large as the seedling plants but you should still be able to get a crop through.
- Mulch and feed asparagus beds. They are gross feeders. Compost and animal manure are ideal.
- Thin apple crops if it looks as if too much fruit has set. More is not better. Trees can overcrop and quality suffers. Shorten the spurs on apples and other fruit trees such as plums and kiwifruit. In other words prune back to two or three leaves on new growth. This encourages the formation of flower buds and fruit for next season. It is the same with wisterias, as mentioned last week.
Category Archives: Seasonal garden guides
This week 8 Dec 2006
- The run of bad weather has been most unkind to roses. Removing spoiled foliage and sludgy blooms will help reduce disease. Prune back to a leaf bud if there are no more flower buds and let the rose come again, hopefully in a sunny spell for repeat flowering types. Keeping air circulation around the roses also helps to keep fungi and bacteria at bay so try not to let other plants cuddle up too close.
- Wisterias need a summer prune to keep them under control and to maximise flower bud set for next spring. Work out which are the main leaders and remove all the rampant spring growth back to four or five leaf buds from the main stems. Don’t worry if this seems extreme – they will stage a comeback and need their winter prune as well. The summer prune is less precise and can be done with hedgeclippers if you are in a hurry. Keep an eye open for borer holes while you do this. Pouring a bit of cooking oil will smother anything down the hole or you can fill the hole with flyspray.
- The wisteria summer pruning regime also applies to apple trees. Hedgeclippers are better than nothing.
- Keep an eye on container plants. They dry out very quickly from here on through summer, especially if they are rootbound and it is very difficult to get the plant to absorb water if it dries out too much. Liquid feed containers and baskets which are full of hungry annuals or perennials. Shrubs which have been planted with slow release do not generally need liquid feeding as well.
- If you have any convolvulus, you should have sprayed it two weeks ago when it was starting to advance. But better now than leaving it. If it is around special plants, use Roundup but otherwise Banvine is the best option.
- If you are battling wandering jew, get in now while it is flushing and in full growth. Deal to it now before it becomes four times the size. Amitrol or Grazon are the best spray options. Roundup doesn’t touch it. If you are hand pulling it, you have to get every last piece out and load it in to a black plastic rubbish bag and cook it in the sun. Under no circumstances throw it over the bank. Every piece will grow again.
- Get in main crop potatoes now and plant pumpkins before it is too late. It is still all on to plant tomatoes, corn and runner beans while keeping successional sowings of broad beans, peas and lettuces going.
This week 8 Dec 2006
- The run of bad weather has been most unkind to roses. Removing spoiled foliage and sludgy blooms will help reduce disease. Prune back to a leaf bud if there are no more flower buds and let the rose come again, hopefully in a sunny spell for repeat flowering types. Keeping air circulation around the roses also helps to keep fungi and bacteria at bay so try not to let other plants cuddle up too close.
- Wisterias need a summer prune to keep them under control and to maximise flower bud set for next spring. Work out which are the main leaders and remove all the rampant spring growth back to four or five leaf buds from the main stems. Don’t worry if this seems extreme – they will stage a comeback and need their winter prune as well. The summer prune is less precise and can be done with hedgeclippers if you are in a hurry. Keep an eye open for borer holes while you do this. Pouring a bit of cooking oil will smother anything down the hole or you can fill the hole with flyspray.
- The wisteria summer pruning regime also applies to apple trees. Hedgeclippers are better than nothing.
- Keep an eye on container plants. They dry out very quickly from here on through summer, especially if they are rootbound and it is very difficult to get the plant to absorb water if it dries out too much. Liquid feed containers and baskets which are full of hungry annuals or perennials. Shrubs which have been planted with slow release do not generally need liquid feeding as well.
- If you have any convolvulus, you should have sprayed it two weeks ago when it was starting to advance. But better now than leaving it. If it is around special plants, use Roundup but otherwise Banvine is the best option.
- If you are battling wandering jew, get in now while it is flushing and in full growth. Deal to it now before it becomes four times the size. Amitrol or Grazon are the best spray options. Roundup doesn’t touch it. If you are hand pulling it, you have to get every last piece out and load it in to a black plastic rubbish bag and cook it in the sun. Under no circumstances throw it over the bank. Every piece will grow again.
- Get in main crop potatoes now and plant pumpkins before it is too late. It is still all on to plant tomatoes, corn and runner beans while keeping successional sowings of broad beans, peas and lettuces going.
This week 24 Nov 2006
- If the rain ever stops, consider giving outdoor wooden furniture a protective coating to prevent mould growth, cracking in the sun and complete dehydration. You can buy product from hardware stores which is excellent but I find rather expensive (well, very expensive if you have lots of wooden outdoor furniture). I use a mix of somewhere around one third to one half raw liniseed oil to two thirds or one half turps, brushed on with a paint brush. The turps makes the oil spread more easily and stops the wood from being sticky for long. It should make outdoor furniture last longer. It certainly makes it look better.
- Fertilise, fertilise and fertilise. This is the optimum time of the year to feed everything and hopefully the worst of the rain has passed so any topdressing won’t wash away.
- Shape, prune and feed rhododendrons now as you deadhead them. They are in full growth so will recover faster from heavy pruning.
- Stop picking asparagus now and give them a good feed, if you have not already done so. If you keep picking the spears, you will deplete the crown and weaken the plant for future cropping. After you eating all its early shoots, the plant now needs the chance to put on some foliage and build strength over summer.
- If your new potatoes have succumbed to blight, as ours have, dig them promptly in case the blight travels down in to the tubers and save some for seed for a late autumn crop.
- Keep the successional sowing of corn, peas and salad vegies going.
- With all the recent rain, staying on top of the weeds has been difficult but take any opportunity to hoe and rake the vegetable garden and to handweed flower beds.
- Botrytis is a problem with grapes in the current conditions. A spray with a suitable fungicide which targets botrytis (such as Bravo) may be advisable. It shows up as brown patches on the leaves at this time of the year and will seriously affect fruit set. Keep vines open by removing excess foliage, thin and unwanted growth along with removing all laterals until the fruit is set. Once this has happened, you let the foliage grow to strengthen the plant.
This week 17 Nov 2006
- Clematis are rocketing away. Make sure they have something to climb up, especially the more rampant varieties which may smother an inadvertent host plant. The same applies for other strong growing climbers, particularly wisteria and tecomanthe speciosa which have the potential to rip the spouting off your house if you turn your back for too long.
- If you are laying mulch on your garden, it pays to get rid of the weeds first. Mulch has to be super heavy duty to kill weeds which are already growing.
- Continue deadheading rhodos.
- Watch for nasty greeblies on your roses, ranging from blackspot to aphids. If you don’t spray roses, you need to ensure they have good air circulation around them and remove diseased foliage and slushy blooms to stop disease and insect infestation getting away on them.
- Last chance to plant celery this season in order to have it ready for winter.
- Now is the time to plant out brussel sprouts, either seeds or plants. Brussel sprouts are one vegetable which is significantly nicer picked fresh from the garden rather than them making a long detour from grower through the supermarket to your kitchen. They do better in a cold climate where they would have been sown in September but in our warm(ish) conditions there is still time to establish good strong plants.
- Plant leeks now if you want good strong plants for next winter. It is the last chance for starting them from seed. If you leave it any longer you will end up with micro veg or baby leeks (which are possibly easy to cope with than baby brussel sprouts).
- Now is the time to plant those kumara plants you have already started under cover.
- Spray grapes now for mealie bug. Confidor and oil appear to be the recommended spray. Orthene is very good if you still have it but you now need a chemicals licence to buy it.
Tikorangi The Jury Garden 