Gardening in North Otago 6th August 2013

Some soft rain and dull damp days start this week but still much is beginning to awake in the garden, I feel spring in the air with swelling of buds, fragrance from winter sweet, witch hazel, Daphne, boronia, and violets wafting to the music I am lucky enough to have playing around our garden. The birds are beginning to nest and I see the first blossom, jonquils, and daffodils gracing fence lines in our garden and about the town. We are coming to the end of pruning with cold, rose-prickled fingers, humping straw bales and barrows of gravel, muddy clothes, and gumboots. It is now time for me to create and dress the garden by planting out, shifting, and feeding. I have been liquid feeding with worm tea from my worm farm, adding at the strength of black tea to a full watering can, then applying generously to all new leaf, budding and flowering plants like polyanthus, forget-me-nots, dianthus, sweet peas, pansy, viola. Any new plantings can be Helped along by feeding now to get their roots going and keep them green and strong through any cold snaps yet to come. Slow-release fertiliser is a great idea now as well, sprinkle around established ornamental and newly planted trees and shrubs to be there ready when the plants need food as they awaken. This week I noticed nice fat buds swelling on the stems of my hydrangeas, I started pruning the more sheltered bushes a couple of weeks back but still left the more exposed a little longer. Prune only those stems that have flowered, cut at the second bud from the bottom, and leave all other stems because these are the flowers for this year. Spread old stable manure around the drip line and a dressing of lime for pink flowers and aluminum sulphate for blue, White never changes, but is best planted in light shade – the flowers will tinge pink in the full sun. It is much easier to control the colour of hydrangeas in a pot, if the PH of your soil is high blue hydrangeas will always revert to pink no matter how often you add aluminum to the soil. If your PH is too high and you want to grow blue hydrangeas in large pots, it would be best to use an acid tree and shrub mix. Using coffee grinds, grass clippings or pine needles spread around the drip line can help lower the PH of pink hydrangeas in the garden and encourage shade into shades of purple. I have found I can pull rooted branches from the base of big old gnarly hydrangea bushes, these take a few years to bush up but it is a sure way to replicate a special variety that has become too large and old for the spot it is planted in. cuttings taken from the hardened geranium stems can be taken now, fresh grown geraniums give amazing colour to a warm sunny garden for all of the growing season and even into the winter, they are so easy to grow from cuttings. Take shortcuttings, semi-hardwood, (not a new green steam), and let them dry out a little before planting, this means you don't have to deal with them straight away. Plant them firmly into a soil and river sand mix, Potting mix is too light to get a tight seal around the cutting. I am forever taking cuttings from geraniums. I like it when I come across them in friends' gardens and give cuttings from mine. Trim dentata lavender now if you haven't already, and it is looking untidy. Dentata is a tall growing one with pale lavender bumblebee flowers and serrated leaves.They will recover quickly from a cutback because they are budding up now, but Leave trimming other lavenders until it is warmer. Lavenders like sweetening up with a dressing of lime now. Time to cut back leggy, straggly bush lavatera now also, they get very woody if left. Keep planting dahlias and gladioli, from now until September. With roses making a move to budding up they will need food to draw on, powdered rose food needs watered in around the drip line, slow slow-release fertiliser will work each time it rains. Trees and Roses are still available in Garden Centres. If you think your garden is too small for trees, I have seen dwarf Peach and Nectarine Trees on offer, what better if you need a little tree to add height in a part of your garden why not have one that blossoms beautifully and then gives you fruit?They are perfect for the smaller garden as they only grow to a width and height of 1.5 meters. They can also be grown in a tub and require very little pruning. There are masses of bedding plants on offer now and the ground temperature is warming up now to get them growing. Vegetables The vegetable garden has been enjoying the rain, it is so good not to have to worry about the bugs during these colder months when planting out leaf veg. Cold and frosty areas inland can make a start now by adding some compost and a little lime in readiness for when you plant out later this month. Let's hope the dull overcast days are over by the time the fruit trees blossom so the bees will come out and set to work pollinating. Keep an eye on peach and nectarine trees, if they are just at bud burst it will be time to spray a copper fungicide to prevent leaf curl. When they are in flower it is too late to spray. The Waireka Valley Lions Club are having trouble locating wool sheds to bag sheep manure for their stalls, I for one would be disappointed if I was unable to fill the boot of my car when needed. If there are Farms in the district that can help keep up the supply please ring Alistair Mavor ph: 03 4371976Cheers, Chers, Linda