July in the Garden
Hopefully we’ve seen the last of the rain now, so the remainder of July should bring long, warm days that continue late into the evening — perfect for pottering in the garden after work, hosting barbecues, and enjoying your beds and borders as they reach their peak.
Deadheading bedding plants and perennials
Keep plants looking attractive and encourage more blooms, whether in beds and border, containers or hanging baskets.
If you just have a few minutes to spare, the time will be well spent dead heading. To keep summer plants and bedding at its best and to prolong flowering, it is essential to dead head. The purpose of dead heading is to encourage more flowering. Once the plant has flowered and set seed, so it can reproduce, plants are often reluctant to flower again, or continuously. Dead heading, which is cutting off the spent flower head, forces the plant back into the cycle to produce flower and seeds again. Some bedding plants, such as Petunias need a lot of attention and constant dead heading.
Some plants need so much dead heading, it can be easier to take the shears to the top growth and often a second growth and flush will follow, as with hardy geraniums, Chives and Nepeta can also be cut back.
How to dead head roses
In July Roses are looking at their best and it is just as important to keep dead heading to get as many blooms as possible. There is a specific way to dead head Roses which is that it is best to snap off, not prune away, the spent flower and it will break just below the flower bud. An equally well-respected way to dead head roses is to prune back from the dead flower to the next leaf joint.
The benefits of water
Water is a precious resource, so consider carefully whether you need to water your lawn and borders. Collect rainwater in a butt. If your lawn looks brown, it will recover once it rains. You can try letting the grass grow a bit longer. If you have a patch that tends to go brown regularly, consider creating a gravel garden in this area. Applying mulch to borders when the ground is wet after rain will help retain moisture.
Watering
Watering is one of the most important jobs when growing plants in containers. Roots need a balance of air and water to grow well which is easy to provide if you have a good quality compost or soil. Almost any type of plant can be grown in a container. Generally, the bigger the pot and the plant, the easier it is to care for.
- Check for moisture daily during warm or windy weather (twice daily in hot weather). If it has rained, it's still worth checking that the soil is moist below the surface.
- Most plants will be fine if they are allowed to dry out a little between waterings and they will adapt to using less water if less is available to them.
- Try to avoid letting plants reach the wilting stage; although they are likely to recover, their growth may be affected.
- If water is not draining out freely, check the drainage holes for a blockage and assess compost structure – as the organic components decay, compost becomes soggy, dense and lacking in air spaces.
- Grouping pots, to provide mutual shade and raise local air humidity, helps reduce their watering needs.
- Mulching pots reduces water lost from the soil by evaporation, but as most is lost through plant leaves careful watering will still be needed.
Feeding
Container plants quickly use up the nutrients in their compost, so most benefit from some feeding to keep them growing well. The frequency of feeding and type of fertiliser varies with the plant and the season.
- Check the instructions on your compost bag to see how long any added fertilisers will last.
- Fast-growing bedding plants, edibles and hungry plants (like roses) benefit from regular feeding from April to the end of August with a general-purpose proprietary liquid feed.
- For long-term plantings, like shrubs in pots, add a controlled-release fertiliser when planting, topdressing or repotting.
- With soil-less composts, make sure fertiliser includes essential trace elements.
- After late summer, feeding is usually suspended until mid-spring; however bedding plants and other short-lived annuals will still benefit from feeding until early autumn.
- Feed when the compost is moist.
Looking after your lawn
This is your last chance to feed your lawn with a special lawn fertiliser to encourage healthy green growth.
- Water newly seeded or turfed lawns in hot weather. Don't allow new lawns to dry out.
- If you’re experiencing prolonged dry weather, set your mower blades higher to reduce stress on the grass.
- If your lawn is infested by ants, brush out the nests on a dry day. Always brush them away before mowing.
- Recut any lawn edges if needed and install lawn edging to make future maintenance easier.
It’s a lovely time of year to be in the garden. Everything is in full leaf, summer flowering plants are in bloom and it’s a joy to be outside. With most of the hard work done, it’s time to relax and enjoy!
Happy Gardening! 🌱