July Gardening Tips!

July is summer, which means we are officially a few weeks in to Summer! How’s your gardening going?

Resident Thorngrove expert Chris Francis has provided lots of brilliant tips for this month, and wow it’s a busy one!

• Check Clematis for signs of wilt (this is where clematis might start dying back for no reason)
• Dead head bedding plants and repeat flowering perennials to ensure continuous flowering
• Pick courgettes before they become  marrows this will also help keep them cropping
• Clear algae, blanket weed and debris from ponds and keep them topped up in the hot weather.
• Give your lawn a quick acting summer feed, especially if you didn’t feed them in the spring.
• Harvest your peaches, apricots and nectarines.
• Order your catalogues so you can order your next year flowering bulbs.
• Water your plants at dusk to reduce evaporation. Use a mulch to help retain moisture around your plants.
• Cut back faded perennials to keep your borders tidy.
• Cut back hardy geraniums and delphiniums after the first flush of flowers to encourage new growth and further blooms .
• Prune your wisterias now, cut back the whippy side shoots from the main branch framework to about 20cm from their base (about 5 leaves from the main stem)
• Divide clumps of bearded Irises so they have time to form roots and flower buds for next year before the cold weather arrives
• July is a good month to spray ground elder, bindweed and other persistent perennial weeds with a glyphosate based weed killer as the plants have lots of leaf surface area with which to absorb the chemical.
• If you are growing aubergines, pinch out the growing tip once they have 5-6 fruits. You can expect to start harvesting mid to late summer, pick the fruits while they are young.
• Water your fruit and vegetable crops daily in warm weather .
• If you are growing potatoes use your grass clippings as a mulch to stop your potato tubers which are near the surface from going green .

  We’d love to see photos of your garden work, so feel free to share them with us via email or on facebook, and if you have any questions about any of the above, or need any gardening advice, just get in touch.

  The garden centre is open 7 days a week too. We look forward to seeing you this summer!