Tag: lawns

July Gardening Advice: Everything You Need to Do This Month

July is a beautiful month for enjoying the garden. Traditionally the hottest month of the year in the UK, July is all about spending time in the garden and enjoying your outdoor space.

When it comes to maintaining the garden, this month is all about keeping on top of your blooms, nurturing your plants, and providing your garden with that extra bit of TLC that it needs to prevent damage or dryness.

Expert gardener Fiona Jenkins at MyJobQuote.co.uk has a list of top tips on what you need to do in your garden during the month of July. Take a look at the list below:

Get The Watering Just Right

With July being typically the hottest month, watering is key. Your plants will be very thirsty at this time and may be prone to drying out. With this in mind, you want to make sure you maintain your beautiful blooms by regularly watering your container plants. Add a balanced liquid fertiliser every couple of weeks, as this will help to encourage continual flowering and strong, healthy growth. Remove all dead flowers as soon as you notice them to encourage new growth.

You also need to remember to water your shrubs, trees, and perennials. Water the base of the plant and avoid watering the leaves, as the leaves won’t absorb water. Wet leaves can encourage fungal diseases, which is why you must always aim to water the base of the plants.

Aim to water your plants first thing in the morning, as this is when the sun rises, and the plants will begin using the water.

Thin Out Your Fruit Trees

In the month of July, you may find that your fruit trees can abundantly over-produce due to the optimal conditions. Large levels of heavy fruits on branches can result in a final crop of much smaller fruits due to the high demand for the tree’s resources and the limited sunlight that is blocked by the large fruit.

This month, you want to focus on thinning out your crops by removing all of the damaged or excess fruits. This will enable the tree to develop a much more even and more appealing crop of fruits.

Show Your Lawn Some Love

During the summer months, everything in the garden grows very quickly. This means you’ll need to make some extra effort to mow the lawn. Aim to mow your lawn once a week to keep it in good shape. It’s also important to keep on top of watering your lawn regularly to prevent it from drying out and turning brown. If the ground becomes dry, gently spike it before watering to allow the moisture to penetrate easily.

Reduce the cutting height of your lawn during hot weather, as this can also help to prevent the lawn from drying out. Keeping your grass blades slightly higher can help the grass thrive and can prevent it from becoming damaged by the additional summer wear.

Take Cuttings From Perennials

When it comes to perennials, it’s important to take cuttings to encourage new growth. Place supports around your tall perennials to prevent any damage from wind, rain, or other typical British weather phenomena.

If you have any tender perennials in your garden, such as Fuchsias, you can use the cuttings for propagating. These perennials are best propagated from cuttings. Cuttings should be taken from the new growth for the season. You can either pot the plants now or keep hold of your cuttings until next spring. If you pot the plants now, they will have enough time to develop a sufficient root system so that they can survive through the winter months.

Get a Head Start on Sowing

If you want to be one step ahead with your gardening routine, consider beginning some of your sowing now. Biennials such as wallflowers, forget-me-nots, and foxgloves can be sown now and ready for planting in autumn. This will provide you with a stunning display next spring.

Sow your plants into large seed trays or, alternatively, a dedicated seed bed. After that, when the seedlings are large enough to handle, you can separate them.

You can also sow late summer and winter crops now, such as carrots, cabbages, and leeks. In addition, you can continue to sow radishes, lettuce, and beetroot at this time.

Check Plant Supports

During this month, you should spend some time inspecting your climbing plants to ensure they are able to handle strong winds and torrential rain. If you think your plants need new or additional support, now is the time to take care of that.

The typical British weather can put a considerable amount of pressure on your garden. It’s much easier to deal with this now than to wait until late summer.

Now is also a time for checking for weeds in flowerbeds, as weeds can affect your plants. It’s much easier to deal with weeds now while the weather is good.

Overseeding You Lawn: top tips from Johnson Lawn Seed

Every year up to a quarter of the average lawn may die. By sowing new lawn seed into an existing lawn, a technique used by professional groundsmen and known as overseeding, it is possible to rejuvenate your lawn and reduce weed invasion.

Lawn renovation should be done in Spring or late Summer to early Autumn depending upon the weather conditions. Here are some handy tips and tricks to help you revive your lawn!

1) Remove any debris from the surface of the lawn and when it is dry to mow it closely

2) Rake the lawn using a spring tine rake or a leaf rake to remove and breakup layers of dead matted grass or thatch. This process is known as scarifying and can be made easier with a powered scarifying machine if the thatch is thick or it is a large lawn.

Scarifying in Autumn has the additional benefit of stimulating the side shoots and runners of the grass which tend to develop at this time of year

3) Spike ground with a hollow tine fork, a normal fork can be used, up to a depth of 15cm(6in) to de compact the soil.

4) Top dress the lawn with a good quality topsoil, making sure the dressing fills the holes created when aerating. This allows water, air and nutrients to penetrate deeper into the soil and will result in deeper rooting, dense grass growth.

Minor hollows can be levelled out using this method too, apply the topsoil so the grass tips are just visible, allow the grass to grow back through and repeat the process until the hollow is filled in

5) It is a good idea to apply some lawn fertiliser when reviving your lawn, Johnsons Lawn Thickener and Johnsons Quick Fix already have fertiliser either coated on the seed or mixed with the seed making them ideal for this task.

If you are using a different mix you can apply fertiliser the same day as sowing grass seed or up to a few days later, poultry manure is ideal. Scatter fertiliser evenly over the lawn surface using the recommended rate on the pack and rake in to ensure even distribution, make sure you follow the manufacturers instructions. Ideally the fertiliser can be watered in at the same time as watering the lawn seed.

6) Using your chosen mix of lawn seed you should aim to apply it at the oversowing rate detailed on the pack, this is usually 25g per sq. metre (¾ oz per sq. yard) to 35g per sq. metre (1 ¼ oz per sq. yard). If you calculate the size of your lawn in square metres and then multiply this by the sowing rate you will have a good estimate of the quantity of seed required.

7) You can apply the seed directly from the pack or you can mix the seed in a bucket with some topsoil to make it easier to sow. It’s a good idea to have a trial run by measuring out, for example, 4 sq. metres, weigh out the correct amount of seed for the area, this would be 100g at a rate of 25g sq. metre, and then scatter evenly up and down, left to right.

You can use this method over the entire area. By doing this you will use the correct amount of seed and achieve a more even distribution.

8) After you have sown the lawn seed gently rake the area and then lightly roll or tread in to firm the seed in. This is a very important as it gives the seed good contact with the soil and will really help it to germinate and establish. Keep off the newly overseeded area if possible to allow tender young shoots to gain strength and help with establishment.

9) While it is good practice for the area to be moist when you sow do not water it until you have firmed the seed in otherwise it will stick to your roller and shoes! If dry weather follows overseeding, water copiously with a fine spray, preferably in the evening, keeping the seedbed constantly moist.

10)When grass is 5-8cms (2-3in) high cut for the first time. Trim lightly and very gradually lower blades to an ideal cutting height of between 50mm (2in) to 25mm (1in) for mixtures containing ryegrass and 25mm (1in) to 13mm (½in) for non ryegrass mixtures.

Mow regularly but try not to remove more than a third of the growth at any one time. What may happen is that the existing grass needs a cut before the new grass. To do this raise the cut to a height that just cuts the old grass and leaves the new intact, you can reduce the height of the cut over the subsequent weeks

To find out more about Johnsons Lawn Seed products please visit:

http://www.johnsonslawnseed.com/product-range.aspx