Your soil should be well prepared for the coming busy growing season in readiness for fast growing plants and extremes in temperature and heavy down pours of rain.

There are plenty of warm season seeds to sow and seedlings to plant in Spring. Keep in mind what you like to eat and what time you have available to have successful crops.

Spring may be here and the equinox is not far away, around the 20th of September. This is a time Mother Nature takes care of business and encourages plants to naturally seed up to make sure there is plenty of gene pool for coming seasons.

Plants are strongly affected by soil temperature and the length of the night  - 'photoperiodism', which may explain a little why Dill & Coriander like to seed up so quickly. They have pre- programmed body clocks.
Keep them in the garden for food for your predatory and pollinating insects.

The soil temperature will not warm up, like the ocean, until late October. Seeds like Basil, Capsicum & Eggplant germinate best with warm soils, around 18 – 22 deg. C

Enjoy!
See you at the Spring Plant Fair Saturday 13th September Bello. Market Site

Things are booming ahead. I have been thinking all month it is August and we are now in October. I hope others experience the same time madness.

This is your last chance to plant your Celery seedlings. Put them in a spot where they may reach morning sun only and are over crowded in the garden to encourage them to stretch and make sweet long stems.

Don't let your Spring plantings of  lettuce  want for water or nutrients. If they stress for any period of time they will taste bitter and bolt.

If you like your Endive to be sweet, place a dinner plate over the plant for 3 – 6 days. This blanches the leaves and encourages sugars and reduces incredibly the bitter flavours. Though I just steal the young leaves from the centre when I'm picking a salad.

An indicator when to sow your next crop of Beans – when your first sow begins to flower, sow the next lot of seeds – succession – perpetual harvesting.

Dig deep trenches to plant your seed potatoes in. They enjoy plenty of soil around them and in turn you will receive a great harvest. Mulch well  so potatoes don't see the sun or they will turn green – toxic.

Carrots too require a deep soil so root can penetrate easily, and not too much nitrogen in the soil as this will make Carrots fork, become hairy and taste bitter. Carrot seeds are fairly small and can dry out very easily when sown direct, especially when it is a pleasant 24 deg C one day and 33 the next (Spring, don't you luv it). Once they are sown and well watered, place a wooden fence paling over the row. Water regularly, lift paling now and then and when germination has commenced, remove paling. Good results everytime.

Mark the calender for when you plant your Tomato & Eggplants. They are very hungry and will perform well with regular feedlings. Don't wet their leaves when watering as this encourages Black Spot on the leaves.

On the other hand, all your Cucurbits – Cucumber, Pumpkins, Zucchini like a well prepared soil at first planting and don't feed them again otherwise they will be happy to grow and not set fruit. Make sure they have lots of sun and a breezy aspect to deter powdery mildew on the leaves. Not wetting the leaves when watering helps reduce this too.

Lastly, I think late at night, Corn loves the company of it's own. Plant in even clumps – circles or even blocks. This encourages good pollination from each other and good cob set. Once the corn is up  about a meter or so, sow climbing beans around the perimeter – a great natural support.

Enjoy your gardening, I am, I just can't help myself when outside to weed and mulch, to plant and harvest. Bonappetite!

Things are a certainly happening now! Especially after the wanted rain.

My Echinacea is waking up beautifully from it's Winter slumber. It is a herbaceous perennial, meaning the above ground parts are annual and the below ground parts are perennial, like Ginger or Turmeric. This in turn tells me the soil is warming up.

Yes, the Nut grass is becoming active tooooooooooooo!
We can't beat it, only live with it. Some have isolated their vege growing area and  painstakingly sieved their soil to rid the dredgit thing. In Permaculture design, in mine anyway, my gardens and surrounds are all one, I don't intend to disturb my soil profile and structure to sieve 5 acres of soil!
Shade is the best deterant of nut grass. Create shade with the plants you want to grow. Then there are times when the nutgrass grows much quicker than your plants. I give it a hair cut closer to the ground with my scissors, cover with news paper, then mulch utilizing the green waste from the nutgrass pruning's. This exposes the plants you want to encourage to grow and gives it a fighting chance. REMEMBER, never pull nutgrass as this propagates it and it will come back tenfold.

On a happier note, my Johnny Jump Up flowers are dancing in abundance with the Poppies in the breeze. They look great in my salad and yummy to eat ( Johnnies that is). They are prolific seeders, don't eat them all, leave some to jump up next Winter.

You may be noticing that your Shallots are flowering nice large pom pom inflorescence, Coriander flowering which attracts your beneficiary insects, Lettuce stretching to create flowers,  Endive and Dandelion Chicory doing the same. Push a small  steak in the ground near them and tie with a red ribbon. This reminds you not to pull them out and that you are saving the seed of these guys. The inflorescence spike becomes quite heavy with fruit and later seed. They will benefit from the support.  Enjoy the beautiful blue flowers of your Endive and Dandelion Chicory, they are stunning against the green background.

Calendula seed is plentiful from their Winter and Spring flowering efforts. Look for brown curly seed where the flower was. Pull gently at the seeds and finish off drying in a paper bag somewhere cool and dark. After a couple of weeks seal them in a plastic bag, put this into an envelope, label and date. I keep all my seed in the fridge in an air tight container as this increases shelf life incredibly.

You may of noticed I have put a lot of flowers into the seed sowing and seedling plant section. They play a huge role in the garden as I have mentioned before in attracting pollinating and beneficiary insects. Planting them now gives you great cut flowers for Christmas. Nothing better than turning up to a Christmas do with a fresh bunch of organically grown cut flowers. I just love Zinnias for this.

Nearly Russian Garlic harvest time, if you haven't snapped off your flower heads do so immediately and eat them. Flower growth is very expensive when it comes to plant reserves, if flowers aren't removed all reserves will go the this and not filling out your bulbs.

Lavender is flowering prolifically, cut, enjoy, then throw it in with your clothes to help deter moths. Cutting the flowers is pruning the shrub which keeps it dense and ready to flower again and again. Rosemary the same. These Mediterranean herbs love being pruned this time of year and benefit well from it. Use longer pruned branches from your Rosemary as kebab sticks, the essential oil will infuse all through.

Lastly, Cucumber, Melons and Pumpkin vines should be getting some length to them now. If they are about 2m long, pinch out the growing tip. This encourages side laterals/branches to grow, and these arms carry your fruit. Mostly male flowers pop out initially, if not all ready female flowers will be showing soon and sitting pretty for the male pollin to be transferred by the bees.