Things to do in the garden in November
As the weather starts to warm up, it is prime time to start sprouting flowers, fruit, vegetables, and herbs in your home garden. Here are a few tips and tricks to get you started:
• Plant and sow to your hearts’ content throughout the garden. Till the soil, water the seeds and seedlings, tie up sappy young growth and enjoy the longer daylight hours to work in.
• Weed, weed and weed some more so your plants receive the nutrition of all your hard work.
• Thin carrots and parsnips.
• Plant sweetcorn in blocks not rows to ensure even wind-blown pollination of the cobs.
• Plant mesclun for an ongoing supply of festive salad greens.
• Begin sowing bush beans in small lots, leaving space for subsequent sowings to maintain a supply of fresh green beans.
• Make sure herb plants are well fed and watered. This is a time of the most vigorous growth for many of them.
• Sow sunflowers for bright colours, chook food and general wow aspect.
• Give asparagus a light feed as you finish cutting the spears and keep them weed-free and moist over the summer. This is when they store strength for next season.
• Check ventilation in green houses is adequate as the days hot up.
• Are all your watering systems in good order?
• Keep young seedlings moist to encourage steady, even growth.
• Use liquid fertiliser on half-grown crops, always putting it onto already-moist soil.
• Feed strawberries with well-rotted animal manure, definitely not fresh. A small handful of blood and bone per plant would also be acceptable. Avoid lime as strawberries like an acidic soil.
• Fertilise citrus trees and other fruiting trees to maintain an even growth of the crop they will now be carrying after spring blossoming.
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This article first appeared in NZ Lifestyle Block Magazine.
