October brings glorious autumn colour as the leaves turn red and orange, even fallen leaves are a lovely bronze or golden colour in the autumn sunlight.
Bedding and Baskets
It is time to remove summer bedding pots. Baskets and borders are probably looking a bit tired and sad by now and so should be replanted with autumn and spring bedding.
Now is the ideal planting time for planting spring flowering bulbs such as Tulips, Narcissi, Crocus, Hyacinths, and Alliums in your borders.
Spring bulbs will give a lovely display in pots and containers; good bulbs for pots are Narcissi 'Tete-a-Tete', Tulipa 'Spring Green' and Tulipa 'Cardinal Mindszenty'.
Lawn Care
Rake up leaves regularly. If leaves are left, this causes grass to die off which then leads to patchy and mossy lawns.
A small amount of leaves can be removed from the lawn with a rotary mower, keep the mower cutting height high but do not use when there is frost lying on the grass.
Good horticultural practice is to feed lawns with an autumn and winter fertiliser. This time of the year we need to encourage root growth and this is done with fertiliser containing a high concentration of phosphate and potash but the nitrogen percentage should be low as new lush blade growth can lead to turf diseases.
Root-ball Trees, Shrubs and Hedging
October is the start of the root-ball and bare-root planting season. Native and other hedging types can be planted now; these are field grown plants, a more economical way of planting a hedge than containerised plants. Root-balled specimen trees and shrubs can be planted between October and early/mid March and you have a huge range of varieties to choose from.
Root-ball trees can be supported with an underground anchoring system which works extremely well when you want to show off the stem of the tree. In addition, it is an almost maintenance free way of supporting the tree.
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