Gardening in October

To add colour to a patio plant up a few containers using plants with autumn and winter interest. Winter flowering pansies, grasses, trailing ivy, evergreens and plants with berries and fruits will certainly help to brighten up the garden on a dull October day.

Plant garlic into the garden in prepared ground that isn’t wet and sticky!  Plant the individual cloves approximately 15-20cm apart and 5cm deep. New shoots will appear later this year, but more importantly the plant will develop a strong root system

If you haven’t already done it, feed your lawn with an autumn lawn fertiliser that is high in phosphate and potash and low in nitrogen to build the lawn up before winter.

Any tender plants such as canna, brugmansia, or abutilon growing outside in large pots should be brought under cover before we start getting hard frosts. To keep the plants ticking over they need a light frost free place.

Any pumpkins or marrows still outside in the garden should be harvested and stored in a frost-free shed until needed.

Spring cabbages can be planted out into prepared ground. When planting make sure the soil is well firmed around the roots of the plants.

On dry days, keep hoeing between shrubs and perennials to chop off any small seedling weeds that have grown during the past few weeks.