The “Season of mists and mellow fruitfulness” begins with September, and how apt, as it is the heart of the harvest, with a large variety of both fruit and vegetables flowing in from the garden and allotment. It is also a time of change as fading summer bedding plants are pulled up to make way for hardier bedding that will take us through autumn, winter and into spring, along with bulbs that promise more colour for next year. September can vary weather wise, but it’s a great month to get planting! Re-plant containers.
Start emptying pots, troughs and hanging baskets of their summer plants, as these will have passed their best by now. Also remove the compost they were in, as it will be spent – spread this on your borders as a mulch. If you can’t bear to part with your summer bedding, then plant other pots up now ready to replace them with later, as winter bedding needs to be able to establish well before the cold weather starts.
Fill with a good quality multipurpose compost (e.g. Miracle gro), adding spring flowering bulbs (see below), and finishing up with your choice of bedding plants: Pansies and Violas that will flower for months; Cyclamen for bright splashes of colour; dwarf Wallflowers; Primroses; Heathers; trailing plants such as Ajuga, Ivy and Thyme; taller plants such as Goldcrest conifers and Cordylines. Arrange these in your containers, making sure all the roots are covered, and keep watered and dead-headed through the season. Remove greenhouse shading. Take down the shading from greenhouses now to let in as much light as possible in. Prune Rose bushes. As rose bushes finish flowering, prune them back by half to prevent them being rocked by strong winds. Always prune to just above a bud. Plant bulbs. Begin to plant bulbs for spring colour. Daffodils, hyacinths and crocus are best planted now but tulips are best bought now but planted in November. For pots, layer bulbs in the compost in reverse order of flowering, placing the later flowering ones in fairly deep, with the earliest just underneath the top planting. New this year, we have a range of bulb collection packs, each having 3 varieties of bulb in complementary colours that flower together, which make choosing bulb varieties and colour schemes that much easier! Protect pots from winter wet. Raise patio containers onto pot feet or bricks to give them an easy way to drain. This is good for the plants not to be sitting in water, but also essential if you have terracotta or earthenware pots in order for them not to crack.
Harvest potatoes. Main crop potatoes can be lifted ready for storage later this month. Make up Hyacinth bowls. Plant hyacinth bulbs that have been prepared for indoor flowering in bowls of bulb fibre, then keep them in a cool dark position for flowering over the Christmas period, a shed or garage would be ideal.
Feed your lawn. Now is the time to give your lawn some attention: feed the lawn with Evergreen Autumn lawn food to green up the lawn, help build up roots for next year and kill moss.
