Tasks, tips and tools for August

This simple and rough guide to August is intended to give you ideas of work to do in the garden during the late Summer. Garden jobs are highlighted in bold black lettering and tools and equipment in blue. 

August. Late summer and well into the school holidays… time to get your kids working in the garden. The nights aren’t exactly drawing in, but June seems a memory away and autumn will no doubt be sneaking around soon with it’s offer of conkers and pretty leaves. Take no notice. Enjoy the last of the summer in your garden, get out your mower and give that lawn a good seeing to. If your garden is large, and you are wondering about the eight hour walk just to mow it, why not think about a Ride-on Mower, like the example below. 

Honda HF 1211 S Ride-On Mower

You may be thinking of storing stuff by now, getting your produce into sacks, making sure its all dry and free from anything creepy and crawly and keeping it somewhere safe.

Onions can now be pulled out and prepared for storage. Use a good garden fork and make sure you don’t damage the onions themselves. Dry them out somewhere warm, on a table in the sun perhaps, so they stop growing and make sure they get stored in a cool and dry place. It’s good time to harvest herbs and dry or freeze them for use over the autumn You will probably be harvesting radishes, carrots, French beans, runner beans, lettuces, spring onions and peas as well as cucumbers and courgettes. If you didn’t do it in July, make sure you sow some greens like perpetual spinach, rocket, pak choi, winter greens like chard and kale, land cress or spring greens to transplant in September or October. Keep on planting leeks and cauliflower if you have the space. Be careful to water well, make sure your water doesn’t just evaporate in the heat and vanish before it has done any good. If you’ve made sure you have saved your rainwater, you could use a rain barrel water pump to irrigate your plants like the example below.

Einhell BG-SP 400 RB Rain-Barrel Pump

Keep your courgettes and marrows well watered. If you’re are a pond person you may find weed is becoming a problem at this time of the year, and it’s amazing how much detritus and organic matter can end up clogging a pond; so make sure you clear your pond regularly to stop it stifling your precious water plants.

Any established hedges could do with maintenance with some trimming during the summer to make sure they stay compact, and the more formal the hedge the more need for trimming. For smaller hedges, a pair of good, sturdy but comfortable to use, hand-held hedge-trimmers would be ideal; but for anything larger, you’ll want some powerful trimmers like the battery powered example below. 

Greenworks G-MAX 40v Cordless Hedge Trimmer with Twist Handle

If you do use electric trimmers, do remember to protect your hands, and wear gloves and goggles!