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Thursday, April 30, 2009
It's here at last, well almost ! The weather is noticeably warmer and the days so much longer (great for getting in early gardening mode!) But there's no doubt that the combination of warmth and rain makes not only your garden vegetable and ornamental plants, but also your weeds, grow at a phenomenal rate so there is plenty to do.
Growing your own vegetables is great fun and need not be a lot of hard work, but if you've not done much you'll need to get your skates on. Many crops such as peas, beans, carrots and salad vegetables can all be sown from seed now, especially if you sow the seed promptly. For crops such as tomatoes, chillis, sweet peppers and aubergines you'll be best of buying a few small plants so that you can catch up on 'lost' time. As soon as the frosts are over tender crops -tomatoes, peppers, aubergines - can be planted out in to your garden, but remember to harden them off gradually before you put them in to the garden.
Don't delay in grabbing a hoe and get all all the weeds as they appear. Some, like hairy bittercress (Cardamine hirsuta) are up and growing and setting seed so fast that you'll really be in for a hard year in the garden if you leave them for too long. If you can choose a hot, sunny day for hoeing so much the better as you can then leave the hoed weeds on the soil surface where they should be frazzled up by the sun, and so there is no risk of their re-rooting.
Make sure that climbers that have already put on growth are properly secured with new ties, and that older ties have not become too tight and constricting. But do make sure that you don't disturb any nesting birds in the process - a dense climber or wall shrub can make a great nesting spot.
Herbaceous perennials will need staking and supporting, and the sooner you do this, the better. You can use proprietary plant supports or save costs and make a very natural and attractive looking support system using twiggy stems cut from hazel, hornbeam, beech or similar woody plants. These are my favourite plant supports as they blend in so well that, in a few weeks time they should be hidden from view. If you're using stems from easy-rooters such as willow to make supports for flowers or wigwams for beans, always wrap the ends of the woody stems in parcel tape before you put them in to the soil - otherwise you're likely to find that they start to root !
Tender summer bedding is everywhere at the moment, but don't be tempted to buy it unless you have a place to keep it, a frost-free spot with plenty of natural light. In most areas of the country frosts are still likely this month (I even had hail in my garden last week, followed by a hard frost a couple of days later.....and that's Hampshire !) But as soon as you can, start to plant up containers with summer bedding for a fantastic display in a few weeks time.
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