MAY In The Garden

Hope you are all enjoying the brilliant autumn foliage around the district now.

Make a note of any particular stunning autumn foliage plants you see and if you have room why not

order a plant and pop it in your garden this winter.

Keep composting all your autumn leaves.

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IN THE VEGGIE GARDEN

PLANT seedlings of:

• Beetroot

• Broccoli

• Broad beans

SOW directing in the ground:

• Broad beans

• Peas

• English spinach

• Asian greens

• mesclun mix

• Rocket

• Coriander.

Keep fertilising your brassicas (broccoli and cabbages etc).

Add some annual flowers to your veggie garden such as alyssum, pansy and viola. These not only add

colour to your garden but attract and provide food for pollinators and other beneficial insects.

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Grow green manure crops to improve soil fertility & structure

If you have some spare ground in your veggie patch, late autumn is a good time to sow cool season

green manures. For cold weather planting use a winter grain such as barley for bulk organic matter

and add hardy legumes such as broad bean and vetch for nitrogen fixing, and mustard for disease

suppression. Broadcast seed on levelled soil, rake lightly and water. Keep the bed moist until

germination occurs. Once the plants are about 30cm tall, and before they flower, slash, and

incorporate all the foliage into the ground and let it rot. The ground will then be ready for your spring

and summer plantings.

Start preparing beds for bulb onions and golden shallots by incorporating some lime and well rooted

cow manure. These need to be planted in early June.

May is an ideal time to dig up, divide and replant perennial food plants such as Jerusalem artichokes,

chives and globe artichokes.

Prepare soil now in advance of asparagus and rhubarb planting season in mid-winter. Both plants like

similar conditions. Add lashings of compost and well-rotted manure, and if drainage is a problem try

making raised beds or planting mounds.

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IN THE ORCHARD

All your cane and bramble berries should have finished cropping so now is the time to prune back

their canes. Autumn fruiting raspberries can simply be cut back to ground level, but summer fruiting

raspberries and blackberries should only have old, spent canes removed. Keep canes that formed over

summer for the following fruiting season.