October Gardening Tips
Here are our October top tips from our head Landscaper..
- Feed your lawn with a Autumn fertilizer (low in nitrogen)
- Give your hedges a final cut to tidy them up for over the winter
- Cover your ponds with netting to prevent leaves from accumulating in the water which in turn will rot down and release a lot of nitrogen and other gases into the water which can be detrimental the pond life
- Place grease bands on your apple trees to prevent winter moth
- Raise the height of your mower blades for the final cut of your lawn by leaving the grass a little long over the winter this will help protect the roots
- Prune any summer flowering shrubs if they require it once they have dropped their leaves
- Tidy up the dying foliage of any herbaceous perennials
- Don’t forget October is the optimum month for planting spring flowering bulbs
- Dig up and store Dahlia and Gladiolus bulbs
- Plant any trees and shrubs since this is an ideal time of year for these plants as the ground is still warm and with rain in the air.
- In the borders, now is a good time to lift and divide herbaceous perennials to fill out spaces. Plant the outside sections of the clumps into fresh soil and compost and discard the central part
- Wallflowers can also be planted now to produce a colourful display in spring. Ensure they are planted quite deep to help avoid them being loosened from the ground by strong Autumn winds
- If you have taken runners from strawberry plants earlier in the year now is a good time to plant them out
- Tender herbs such as basil, coriander, parsley, dill and mint cannot withstand frost and it is best to pot them up and bring under cover before any Autumn chill.