Blog

June has arrived and started with sunshine and showers, the perfect growing weather. This is a busy month planting out for the summer ahead as hopefully any risk of frost should now be long gone.

1. If your sweet peas are like those on the Kings field, they should be starting to bloom soon. Always pick the stems regularly to prolong the flowering period otherwise they will set seed and stop flowering. The changeable weather and cool nights can cause bud drop this month, don’t worry if this happens, as the plants will soon settle down once the weather becomes more settled and warm.

2. Around the second week of June, I make my last sowing of Runner Beans. For this later sowing I choose a white flowered variety such as White Lady or Moonlight. White flowered varieties are more tolerant to heat and will produce you a bumper harvest, which will often continue well into October, depending on the weather.

3. This month is a busy time if you grow summer bedding, like me. Now’s the time to finish planting your summer bedding plants into borders and containers. Hanging baskets can be hung out. Once completed you can sit back and enjoy your display for many months ahead.

4. This month is the idea time to get all those tender vegetable crops planted out. Sweetcorn, courgettes, squashes, outdoor tomatoes, runner and French beans can all now safely be planted outside on your plot.

5. As space comes available on the vegetable plot, or if you have some spare containers fill these areas up with further sowings of summer salads like Rocket, Lettuce, Radish, Beetroot, and mixed salad leaves.

6. Make a sowing of Carrot Eskimo this month under Enviromesh and these will be ready to pull as finger Carrots for your Christmas lunch.

7. This month the soft fruit bushes will be producing a bumper crop of fruit, so it is important to erect some protection nets over the bushes, to stop any birds having a feed of your Raspberries, Blackcurrants or Strawberries before you do.

8. Tomatoes, Cucumbers and Peppers growing under glass in grow bags and pots need regular watering. As soon as the first fruits set on tomatoes and peppers these can be fed once a week with a high potash feed. As soon as fruits start to appear on Cucumbers, start feeding once a week with a teaspoon of dried blood (a high nitrogen feed) sprinkled around the root, but away from the stem and watered in.

9. As gardeners we are always looking ahead, toward the middle of June is the ideal time to sow Wallflowers and Sweet Williams for your autumn bedding display.
These can be sown in an area, direct into the vegetable plot and be grown on until large enough to lift and transplant to your flower borders this autumn. Toward the end of June sow pansies and violas under glass and prick out into pots or trays, ready for autumn displays. When sowing pansies and violas at this time of year and if the weather is warm and temperatures are above 20C it can inhibit germination. So a handy tip is to put the seed packets in the fridge the night before sowing them as this will chill the seed down and aid germination. The same trick can be used when sowing Lettuce seeds at this time of year.

10. Vegetable crops are starting to be ready to harvest - This can be a time-consuming job. This month you should be able to start harvesting, radish, lettuce, spring onions, beetroot for a tasty salad, peas, broad beans, summer cabbage, new potatoes and maybe a few early carrots to enjoy in your main meal.

Happy harvesting!