Head Gardeners’ tips
July 2023

July is the time to really enjoy your garden. Take time to relish the calming colours of the green spring growth slowly darkening into summer. Enjoy the heady scents on summer evenings. Many flowers are blossoming, and delicious edible produce is beginning to ripen.

The longest day of the year has passed, bringing with it warmer days and more sunlight. Last month was the hottest June on record in Britain! As well as being hot we have had very little rain over the last few months, but I hope you’ve recently had a few good overnight soakings. Try to use your collected rainwater for your evening waterings, allowing the plants to absorb the moisture during the cooler evening hours.

Here are a few jobs to keep up with in July:

• Stake your tall herbaceous perennials.
• Regularly pick your sweet peas and they’ll continue to bloom.
• Hoe weeds in your borders on sunny days before they are established.
• Dead head repeat flowering plants.
• Cut back any seed heads you don’t want to self seed.
• Start taking cuttings from tender perennials such as salvias, pelargoniums, penstemons.
• Prune your wisterias if they’ve filled their space by removing the long whippy side shoots from the main branch framework to about 20cm from their base (about five leaves from the main stem).
• Feed your roses now after the first flush of flowers, for a second flush. Keep dead heading if you’re wanting more flowers and not wanting hips.
• Feed and keep watered your containers. Add fresh compost if some has been washed away, it’ll help with water retention.

Most of all, be sure to spend quality time in your garden. Reflect on your labours, however large or small. Remember to take moments to really ‘see’ your garden. It’s very easy to get caught up in all the jobs that need doing rather than standing back, sharing in your garden with others and really enjoying it – because you deserve it!