For ongoing beautiful harvests, jobs for August
A fast moving month, perhaps with more jobs than you can manage. I highlight some important and enjoyable ones.
I hope that your plot is looking beautiful and I want to inspire you in that direction as well.
1 Watering may be a big job this month, we look at which vegetables need extra water.
2 Weeding is important, even if they are small! If you don't deal with them, they will take over a lot of space and more time is then needed later on. Remember to weed, small and also keep edges under control!.
3 Tidy! General tidiness makes a huge difference such as removing older leaves of any plants. Plus diseased leaves. This also reduces slug habit and creates beauty.
4 Compost. All weeds, crop residues and diseased leaves can go on the compost heap, and this is a month when you could make a lot of new compost, possibly ready by winter. Work at finding lots of materials, even from other people. The proportion of ¼ brown to 3/4 green means you may need to search for more browns, anything of woody origin.
5 Picking is one of the bigger jobs and can result in more material for the compost heap. I use chard as an example to show nice ways to harvest leaves.
6 Fruiting vegetables. We look at tomatoes in the greenhouse, and melons too. Pick at breaking stage. Also holy basil.
7 Be ready for pests. I show some sad slug damage to new broccoli plants, and the beetroot I planted to replace them.
8 Use covers where appropriate. Such as young carrots will soon need mesh over, against root flies.
9 Sow and plant. There are many sowing and planting opportunities, especially spinach and oriental leaves plus salad rocket in early to mid-August. Then spring onions and spring cabbage in late August. It's good to have transplants ready, for gaps which keep appearing at this time of year, after harvests.
See my website blog for more details https://www.charlesdowding.co.uk/blog
And my Sowing Timeline https://www.charlesdowding.co.uk/reso...
My new Compost book:
1 pre-order https://geni.us/Compost
2 signed copies https://www.charlesdowding.co.uk/prod...
Filmed and edited by Carly Dutton-Edwards 26th July 2024 at Homeacres garden, Somerset UK, oceanic temperate climate 51° north.
00:00 Intro
00:56 Lack of sunshine and rain - signs a plant needs water
01:42 Plants that survive well without water
02:15 Plants that need water
03:25 Weeding, and how no dig keeps moisture in the soil
05:00 Edging and tidying, removing decaying leaves
07:02 Adding these leaves to compost, and crop residues, eg potatoes
07:37 Blight in compost heaps, and weeds
08:05 Adding material to heaps - greens and browns
09:36 Picking when there is excess growth, eg chard
11:02 The benefits of regular picking
13:40 Warmth-loving plants in the greenhouse
14:09 Tomatoes - 12th year of growing in the same soil
15:00 Maintenance of tomato plants, and when to harvest
18:05 Melons Emir - how to tell when ripe, and some anthracnose disease
19:27 Holy basil Ocimum tenuiflorum, also called tulsi, and its amazing flavour
19:56 Slugs, damage caused
21:25 Carrot root fly, cover by 10th August
21:58 Mildew on cucumbers
22:19 Outdoor tomatoes - slow growth of fruits, how to manage
22:54 Sowing and planting in August, thinking ahead
Music by @rorydinwoodiemusic
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