August should be a quite month in the garden with plants and lawns growth slowing. Now it is time for you to sit back and enjoy the hard work you put into your garden.
Watering
Keep containers and pots regularly watered as they can dry out very quickly especially with peat based compost. A product call ‘Swell jell’ helps to retain moisture when mixed in with compost.
It you going away, move your pots into a shady area away from full sun and for larger areas set up an automatic watering system or ask a friend/neighbour to water for you.
Mulching the borders will help to keep in the moisture; if you mulched in the spring just top up the mulch around the plants.
Pruning and Hedge Cutting
Summer prune Wisterias by cutting back the long side shoots to 6 inches, about 4 -6 leaves. Tie in some of the growth on to training wires. It’s a good idea to feed with a high potash fertiliser, as this will improve flowering next year.
It also a good time to trim the hedges but try to avoid very hot days. When I worked at Winchester College, we would cut all the Yew hedges in August these would then keep their shape throughout winter. It’s also a great time for Conifer hedges to be cut and shaped.
Deadheading is an important task and can be very therapeutic. It helps repeat flowering plants such as Roses and Pelargonium to flower more and they look so much nicer when done.
Lawns
Try to keep them healthy by weeding, feeding and watering in the late evening. If August is a warm one, raise the cutting height of the mower. Feed the lawns in early August but do not apply a control release as we are coming to the end of the growing season.
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