Page 8 - Oundle Life June 2022

JUNE’S
GARDEN
Colour and scent...
June is perhaps my favourite month in the garden. The first month of summer brings those long days as we celebrate the summer solstice. The temperature is warming up nicely and everything starts to fill out and bloom, looking its lush best. Think peonies, hydrangea, foxgloves, lavender, clematis and roses all in flower in the late evening sun and you know it is June!
At the start of June this year, we will celebrate the Queen’s Platinum Jubilee marking 70 years since she took the throne. The simplest way to make a patriotic looking plant display is to use summer bedding plants in red, white and blue.
Bedding plants can be planted in containers, hanging baskets or traditionally straight into borders to fill gaps or create blocks of colour or patterns. Simple displays often make more of
an impact, so group several plants of one colour or variety together. They start small, but very quickly fill out in the warm weather. Remember to keep them watered, especially those in containers. Deadheading the old flowers will encourage more blooms to grow throughout the summer. These fast growing, hungry plants will appreciate a feed too giving them extra nutrients they have absorbed from compost they are
planted in. A multipurpose fertiliser or even a tomato fertiliser from the Garden Centre will do the trick once every week or so.
In the edible garden, tender vegetables
such as squashes, French beans, tomatoes and peppers can be planted out now. Pinch out the side shoots from tomatoes as they grow and remember to start feeding them once the first truss starts setting fruit. Lettuce, radish and early potatoes should be ready to be harvested now. Keep an eye on your onion and garlic as when the leaves start to yellow and die back, they can be harvested too.
Further jobs for June include weeding, weeding and more weeding. Just as June brings out the best in the plants we want in our garden, conditions are ideal too for the weeds. Keep borders hoed regularly to keep tiny seedings from growing bigger. Spring flowering climbers such as clematis montana or flowering shrubs such as lilac can be pruned now flowering has finished.
Enjoy June and the rest of the summer in your gardens!
www.thebarngardencentre.co.uk
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