Get into gardening

Vegetable Garden

Hardy varieties of peas and broad beans can be planted now. Most benefit from cloche protection in winter, especially in very cold areas.

Tip:
It’s worth buying fleeces that fit over hoops and pots to help protect your crops.

Bedding Plants

Deadhead the last of your flower blooms and continue to water plants, particularly if there's a dry spell. Get a head start on next year's bedding displays by taking cuttings from summer-flowering Pelargoniums. Or pop to Homebase where a wide range of autumn/winter bedding plants are available.

Bulbs

Plant a few early-flowering bulbs in pots and planters for colour and scent next year. It’s a good time to choose your daffodil varieties.

Plant any spring flowering bulbs (you’ll find a great range at Homebase).

Containers

During the hot weather, water pots and hanging baskets at least once a day and remove any dead flower heads. Also use a feed once a week to keep everything looking great.

Fruit

Once you've picked your last raspberries, cut back the canes that have produced fruit to ground level, and tie in the best new canes.

Harvest apples, pears and plums.
(Make sure you store apples carefully by wrapping them up individually in newspaper).

Protect your autumn raspberries and blackberries from birds with netting.

Plant blueberries and strawberry beds ready for next summer.

Lawn

Keep up the weekly mowing and edge trimming to maintain a healthy green lawn. Repair and renovate your lawn by raking it vigorously to remove any dead or dying grass.

Perennials (winter surviving plants)

Any large clumps of summer-flowering perennials, like Daylilies can be divided up to make new plants.

Easy seeds to collect are Love-in-a-mist, Foxgloves and Honesty. All you have to do is cut off seedheads from healthy looking plants, place them into a paper bag and store until they're ready for sowing.

Check Homebase for a great range of perennial and hardy annual seeds.

Roses

Once blooms have faded, prune out any thin, diseased or out-of-place branches, and tie in new growth.

Shrubs

September is the best time for planting when the soil is warm and there is a chance of a shower – ideal conditions for quick root establishment. Put mulch (bark or straw) around young shrubs in preparation for winter.

Trees

Plan your garden structure and think of year-round interest (i.e. colour, height and shape). Choose shrubs and trees such as euonymus and Acer for their vibrant leaf colour. Salix is a good option for wet areas and gives structure to the garden.

Water all newly planted trees well for the first year – it takes at least a year for new roots to develop deep into the soil for the tree to be fully settled in.

Vegetables

Continue picking beetroot, celery, sweetcorn and onions.
Keep greenhouse vegetables well watered.
Plant any last minute salad varieties.
Ripen late crops of tomatoes.
Dig up any remaining potatoes before slug damage spoils them.
leafy vegetable crops with bird-proof netting.
Plant broad beans and hardy peas for early crops next year

Vegetable to sow now include: spring cabbages, Japanese onions, turnips for green tops, winter lettuces, spinach, endive, salad (lambs lettuce), land cress and baby salad leaves.

Wildlife

Let flowering plants go to seed (sunflowers, ornamental grasses and Knifophia) it’ll provide extra food for wildlife.

Plant evergreen shrubs such as Ilex (holly) & Pracantha to provide shelter and food for wildlife during winter.