Overcast,dull days and still very wet and sticky ground but plants and new lambs are pushing on and making it feel more like spring everyday.
This week I have been doing the final winter clean up around the gardens i do not mulch with pea straw, these gardens get a covering of the lovely black compost we get each year from the Pukuiri freezing works, which allows the bluebells, and daffodils to take center stage for the next couple of months. I do have pea straw in areas where bulbs are growing and now that I can see where where they they are popping up clear keep it clear around them so the needed light can get to them.
Weeds are growing!! nights and mornings are so cold but the afternoons are very mild and these conditions seem to promote weeds. Start your spraying programme and zap them while still very small.
After all the rain moss is thriving in lawns, pathways and garden structures. There are a lot of products out there to deal with moss but killing the moss in lawns is simply a short term measure they do nothing by way of treating the basic problem of moss in lawns. They simply kill the moss which is there. It will return

If you really want to eradicate moss from your lawn, then you have to find out the actual problem that is causing it, the reasons are various, but not too difficult to isolate. Moss is a sign that something is basically wrong with your lawn, and because there are so many moss kill products on offer encourages gardeners to just treat the problem off moss every year.

Things that could be causing moss in your lawn could be:


Water logging - in winter or summer.
Poor feeding regime - usually shown by light green grass.
soil too acid - carry out a test, lime may be needed.
Shaded Lawns - overhanging trees or large shrubs.
Mowing lawns too close is a very common cause, for it weakens the grass allowing moss to take hold
Drought - if severe enough to harm or kill the grass. Not to be confused with a bit of summer-browning
Sandy - free-draining soils. This can weaken the grass and allow moss to take over. Some mosses are quite happy in these conditions. Add humus (compost or sieved soil) to add more body and rake in, this will encourage worms as well.
Compaction - continued use by children and pets with no remedial attention by way of aeration in the Autumn.
Generally, lawns that are well maintained - which includes being well fed, cut properly, aerated and de-thatched - problems which result in moss will not occur in the first place. Moss can rarely compete with strong growing grass in lawns. Get the grass growing properly starting with the first spring feeding.

Treating small areas of lawn moss can be carried out with sulphate of iron watered on at the strength displayed on the pack per sq meter. After a couple of weeks, you can rake out the dead moss and re-seed. If you need to use a feed for the area, it is better to feed the whole lawn in order to avoid patchiness!

Staying with grass, trim back ornamental grass's now, cut back the old seeded ends and clean out the dead thatch around the base, its amazing how much you will need to cart away up after this hair cut but they will look wonderful and will grow back to their soft wafting shape in no time. Use what you have cut off as mulch around the garden, a cover for the compost or in the chook or calf house if you have one.

It is at this time of the year I notice yellowing of some plants, the ground gets depleted of nitrogen during winter especially when plants are shallow rooted like camellia and rhododendrons, and potted plants with roots trapped in what you have planted them in. With applications of complete plant food and compost this condition will be rectified, all the slow release fertilisers on offer now it's makes it easy, each time it rains or you water food is released to the plant.

Vegetable

Pick winter crops while still at their best - Fold cauliflower leaves over and tie to protect from frost and keep florets tight.

Dig over empty sections of the vegetable garden, avoiding working on wet soil, to prepare for next seasons crops. Add well-rotted compost and dig in well..

Asparagus is a vegetable that repays planting over many years. To prepare beds cultivate deeply and add generous amounts of compost. Existing asparagus beds should be cultivated carefully to avoid damaging the crowns that lie just below the surface, add a new layer of mulch.

To get spring sowings off to an early start now, use a row of cloches or a stretch of clear polythene to warm and dry out the soil. Garlic and shallots can be planted here on the coast along with broad beans. In cooler districts - nothing yet except under cover - cabbage, cauliflower, broccoli and lettuce seedlings can be nursed along until it's time to plant out.

Fruit

Fruit trees - remove secondary growth since summer pruning of trained fruit trees. Citrus are susceptible to water logging so avoid over-watering and always ensure that your trees have good drainage and are not sitting in a puddle of water.

Cheers, Linda

Gardening in North Otago August 7th 2010

August,and a cold snap to remind us that it is still winter even though so much is beginning to awake in the garden, I feel spring in the air with the fragrance from winter sweet, witch hazel and Daphne wafting to the music of Chopin around our garden. The birds are beginning to nest and my first jonquil has opened. I do love the beginning of a new growing season as you can surely to tell!

After months of hard stuff going on in this garden it is now time to create and dress the garden by planting out, feeding and watering. I have been liquid feeding with worm juice from my worm farm, which I add at black tea strength to a full watering can then apply generously to all new leaf and budding plants like pollyantha's, forget-me-nots, dianthus, sweet peas, pansy, viola and winter roses. Helping them along with feeding now will get their roots going and keep them green and strong through the 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 needs food.

This week I finished pruning the hydrangeas and noticed nice fat buds swelling on the stems, cut only those stems that have flowered at the second bud from the bottom, 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. It is much easier to control the colour of hydrangea's in a pot, if the PH of your soil is high they will always revert back to pink from blue no mater how often you add aluminum to the soil, used coffee grinds and grass clippings as well to help can help keep the PH low. If you plan to grow some in large pots to achieve a certain colour it is best not to use any soil from your garden.
Grow some cuttings from the hardened hydrangea, flowered steams which have been removed. A shaded moist area is best for planting these and hopefully roots will grow to feed the buds on the cuttings. Some times I get good results by covering the cuttings with a box keeping the light out and holding the buds back to encourage roots.

I have also been taking cuttings from the hardened off geranium steams, 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 short cuttings with semi hard wood, (not a new green steam) and let them dry out a little before planting them, which means you don't have to deal with them straight away. plant them into a soil and river sand mix and firm down, Potting mix is too light to get a tight seal around the cutting. I am forever taking cuttings from geraniums I like when I come across them in friends gardens, and giving cuttings from mine.

Trim dentata lavender now, that's the tall growing one with the lavender bumblebee flower, they are budding up now ready to burst into flower. Lavenders like sweetening up with a dressing of lime. Leave trimming other lavenders a little longer

Cut back bush lavatera now also, they get very woody if left.

Dahlias, gladioli, and peonies are coming into the Garden centers this month, they can be planted from now until September.

Apply a dressing of Rose Food to establish Rose's and Water in well.

Fruit Trees and Roses are still available in most Garden Centres. If you think your garden is too small for fruit trees, I have seen dwarf Peach and Nectarine Trees on offer, what better if you need a little tree to add height in an era 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 metres. They can also be grown in a tub and require very little pruning.

The vegetable garden is still enjoying a frost or two, although my raised gardens are in such a sunny location I would have liked a few harder frosts to break up the soil. I am still digging carrots and using silver beet and broccoli, and the leeks are growing well, it is so good not to have to worry about the bugs during these colder months. If your veg garden is still cold and frosty there is not much for you to do apart from adding some compost and a little lime in readiness for when you plant out later this month.

I see the bees at work already which is a good sign for the soon to be happening fruit blossom pollination .

Cheers, Linda.
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Gardening in North Otago 31st July 2010

What a lovely winters week we have had in North Otago, frost, sun and blue, blue sky's
Trees and shrubs have been moving around our garden this week, now that trees are bare I can see where some trees and shrubs would be better in another place.
If you have a shrubs or trees that are not growing in the right spot?

It's best to dig them up carefully and shift them now, in winter, while

they are dormant, and to give them time to adjust to a new home

before spring growth starts.

Once dug out dig a hole twice as big as the root ball, cut back any

damaged roots and invest in some peat moss to put in the bottom of

the planting hole, add water to wet the peat, new feeder roots

will grow well.

Each large transplant should to be staked well against the coming

winds until new roots have established well enough to hold it.




Best to get all your winter pruning done before the end of the month and spring bud burst. Once roses are all pruned they can be sprayed with a copper spray mixed with winter oil to clean up disease and seal cuts. Follow directions printed on containers.

Citrus and tamarillo will be ripening and colouring up with the frosty days we have been experiencing. Prune your citrus shrubs as you pick the fruit by cutting stems out to open up the bush to the sun so as to encourage new growth and flowers in spring.

If your lemons are dry and pithy this winter it will be most probably due to a lack of nitrogen last summer when the fruit was developing. Give your bushes plenty of nitrogen next summer, nitrophoska blue would do the trick.

I have seen tamarillo growing here in North Otago on the coast, the cheerful bright red fruit are wonderful to see in a winter garden and will withstand coastal frosts. For best flavour harvest tamarillo when they fall, rather than picking them off the tree.


Vegetable garden

It's time to start tidying up the garden in preparation for spring planting. Clear weeds and give a dressing of manure, compost and a little lime to the soil where you have recently grown crops, this will prepare for the next round of planting. However not all crops like lime – potatoes and tomatoes don't, but peas, beans and capsicums love it along with the worms.

Cut down and dig in green manure crops such as mustard, lupin and oats to help improve soil fertility. Cut them down before they flower and dig them into the soil shallowly. It takes at least a month to six weeks for them rot down before replanting new veges.

Cheers, Linda (Parkside Stone & Garden Weston)

Gardening in North Otago 24th July 2010

Wet through the week, good to get moisture into the garden if we are not going to get a snow fall to add deep moisture to the ground before spring then any rain is good.

It has been another week of pruning and composting here around this large, never ending garden! I am so pleased the rain will be taking the compost down to the roots of the plants. It may look as if growth has stopped but here on the coast with the warmer ground there is plenty of feeding going on. The bulbs are starting to make an appearance and will benefit from a dressing of compost along with hellebore (winter roses) which are looking wonderful right now and pansy's, pollyanthas, and violas are brightening up the gardens as well right now, all these plants respond really well to dried blood sprinkled around them.
Dried blood is also a good tonic for yellowing camellias and rhododendrons, mix it with camellia and rhododendron fertiliser and apply now while there is rain about and they will reward you well come spring.
The garden shops are full of colourful sesanqua camellias in flower, different varieties of flowering hellebore's and cyclamen to brighten up indoors and porches.
These plants will have been grown under protection to get them looking so good so don't be too quick to plant out in the garden, let them harden off gradually first.

Take saucers out from under tubs and planters now as nights will likely freeze after this rain and frozen saucers will freeze the roots of your plants.
Because we have had it quite mild here on the coast this rain will saturate the foliage of tender plants like geranium and pelagonium plants, it would be best to put a cover of frost cloth over those planted in the garden and move potted ones in under cover before they freeze while wet.

Roses:
Mulch, mulch and more mulch. Apply a thick layer of mulch on and around your roses in winter. This protects the root zone and enables the plant to concentrate on root movement and getting ready for the up coming growing season. Un-sprayed Pea or barley straw and well cooked compost are all ideal for mulching. I notice the mulch cooking and steaming away at the resource recovery park each time I am there with my recycling. This compost will be clean of weed seeds and is a very reasonably priced option to use for mulching the garden. Old stable manure can be applied around roses during the winter months before applying mulch, then in early spring apply rose fertiliser and water in well to ensure there will then be enough food for the roots when roses start growing from the top again,
An application of Rose Fertiliser will enhance the establishment and growth of healthy roses. This fertiliser has an excellent level of potassium, which is the nutrient responsible for promoting large, vibrant, healthy blooms. For established roses apply 200 g (1 cup) per square metre and water in well. An application just before the end of winter is a good idea, if buds are swelling they are using food. Apply again in mid December for an autumn flush of blooms.
Vegetable garden:
To have Christmas new potatoes you need to start thinking about them from now on, all varieties are available in shops now. There are early and late varieties so ask about the variety you choose, a potato is not just a potato any more! Lay your seed potatoes out on a tray in a dark dry place and get them sprouting and ready to plant out when the frosts have past.
There will never be a better time to choose and plant ornamental and fruiting trees than right now! Each tree will have an informative label to tell you exactly what you will be buying with instructions on how and where to plant. All fruit trees need to grow in an open sunny position.
Keep sowing vegetable seeds in trays for planting out later, plant Cauliflowers and Cabbage seedlings and sow early Peas. In warmer areas you can also plant Lettuce, Silver beet and Broccoli seedlings and Onions
Asparagus crowns are now available and can be planted out in a well composted and fertilised bed. (no animal manure though)
Cheers, Linda.

Gardening in North Otago 17th July 2010

Another good weather week for Oamaru and a good productive week again in the garden for me. We are getting the good hard frosts we need now so I covered plants like bougainvillea, hibiscus, pelargonium and young daisy bushes. The first hard frost took the front of my large bougainvillea but hopefully it is still protected further in by the damaged outer growth and I don't loose it all together.
Established Margarette daisy bushes will take a knock from the frosts but just leave them, if they do as that frosting on the outside will protect the new growth beneath. In land towards Kurow way gardeners will need to take cuttings of daisy bushes, geranium and paligoniums and protect them until spring because the frosts are too harsh for that soft growth.
I have been pruning back hydrangea's growing in sheltered places around the garden and leaving those which are growing out in the open, the spent flowers left on these will protect them from the frosts.
Prune just before spring by cutting each flower stem off at the second bud from the bottom, leave the stalks which have leaves at the top because these are your flowering stems for this year.
Give pink hydrangeas a dressing of lime now to keep them pink and blue hydrangeas a dressing of sulphate of allium or the specially prepared blue hydrangea mix that can be bought from the garden centres.
This week I attacked a group of large leggy rhododendrons that had leaves, buds and blooms only on the top of long woody branches taller than myself. I was only going to cut the woody non productive wood off because the bushes were beginning to flower, however once I started I ended up cutting them all right back to a healthy bulging nodule and then they got compost and straw, fingers crossed they will push out new bushy growth in the spring.

More rose pruning this week as well, I had to invest in some new secateurs as the pair I have been using did not cut clean and rips on a rose prune will not allow the cut to seal well which will result in die back and this can sometimes claim the whole branch.

Winter is the time you will find the best selection of fruit trees in garden centres. It may be cold and miserable outside but it's the best time to buy your trees for planting through the cold months. They are usually grafted and tall growing so plant up to where they were planted in the bag and stake well to protect against the wind.
A tip I read the other day that could work to eradicate codling moth attacking apple trees. quarter fill a tin or plastic milk container with treacle and hang in the tree it is said to attract male grubs because the treacle is said to smell like the female codling moths pheromone which will attract the male grub into the container to reach a sticky end. A double bonus is that the treacle will attract grub eating birds.

vegetable garden:
Time to start preparing the soil for spring planting. Cultivate vacant spaces, digging in green crops sown earlier. Add compost, and lime if you feel the ground is sour. Dig compost into wet, boggy soils.
Sow seeds of broccoli, cabbage, broad beans, cauliflower, peas, lettuce, onions, radish, spinach, silverbeet, swede and turnips.
In warmer districts sow carrots, parsnips and beetroot.

Gardening in North Otago July 10 2010

Still settled sunny days here in North Otago, how lucky we are, I have been busy as most gardeners will be getting ready for spring. Still cleaning up after the removal of so many established climbers cut out, tying back shrubs that had been growing away from where the climbers were growing and watering shrubs that had been shearing the soil and living the shade of the removed climbers.
Roll on spring I am excited about the new look areas that are now getting a chance to grow and add new interest to our garden.
I am still rose pruning and cleaning up around the base of bushes before composting and mulching with pea straw.
Roses are very susceptible to disease especially scale infections on the trunks and branches. A safeguard at this time of the year for the eradication of all rose diseases is lime sulphur, this spray will completely defoliate rose bushes, this is why now is the time to use it, before new growth begins. Also use on deciduous fruit trees,(not apricots) and tolerant ornamental's for Scale insects, moss and lichen Use 100ml in 1.5 litres of water. For pear leaf blister mite control apply just before buds open. Lime sulphur can not be mixed with other sprays. Spray with winter oil a few weeks later to seal pruned roses.
July is the month of the year for pruning. Deciduous fruit trees, if they were not pruned after fruiting they can be cut back now. Thin out crowded growth and shorten long shoots. They are budding up to blossom soon so a little potash to encourage fruiting and a dressing of compost would be beneficial.
Clumps of day Lillie's can be broken up and replanted into composted soil, I cut back all remaining leaves then put a sharp spade through and half and quarter clumps.
Rhododendrons and camellias are well budded now and will start blooming from now on, keep an eye on the ground around these bushes, water at the start of a day if you think they may be dry. Rhododendrons, camellia's and azalea's are all very shallow rooted and benefit from being mulched with compost or peat before spring.
Vegetable seeds planted into seed trays under glass now will get a good start to becoming strong young plants for planting out in spring. Sow spinach, broccoli, cabbage, lettuce. On the coast Plant broad beans and peas directly into the garden. Strawberries in pots wintered over in a glass house will fruit several weeks earlier than strawberry plants grown outside. In colder areas where the ground is frozen there is nothing to do in the vegetable garden for a while yet.
Cheers, Linda

Another nice crisp winter week, there was heaps more done in my garden this week, I bit the bullet and had numerous climbers cut off at ground level! They were the wonga wonga vines which have created wonderful cover on the tall wire shelter fencing we have around our circular garden, butater 20 years the trees and shrubs have grown up and the climbers are not needed now. They were really mature thick trunk like vines which have wanted to grow over anything in their path. Now it will take a while to pull them off but with cutting them off at ground level they are dieing and shrinking which will make it easier to pull them down.

With all the leaves cut from the hellebore's and new flowers popping up right now they are so pretty. I notice the Daphne's and which-hazel are about to flower and a lot of buds and flowers appearing on primroses and polyanthus so winter is not so dull here on the coast.

The garden centres are busy this month with lots of new stock coming in, like roses, deciduous trees and shrubs, bulbs, dahlias, gladioli and peonies so lots of planting to do once you have your garden cleared of all the old autumn leaves.
If you are thinking of new tree planting, don't hesitate choose while the selection is good and get them in right now to get the most new root growth going before the dry summer days to come.
I am finding the ground perfect for planting, lots of moisture and not frozen like some years in the past at this time of the year, there is still heat in the sun which makes perfect planting conditions.
Because there is warmth through the days I have kept sowing seeds which I am keeping under glass and I expect good germination.

While composting around established rhododendrons I have found at least six runner plants which had layered themselves down and made nice roots into the ground. I cut the runner from the mother plant and dug around the new root ball, removed the new small bush's and planted them around the garden. This layered rooting only happens if the ground is moist enough. Have a look around the ground area of your established shrubs and see what you can find they will transplant well right now.

This is the only time to transplant peonie roses but be very careful not to damage the new shoots forming now, peat added in the planting hole is beneficial to assist new root growth.

keep the rose pruning going, the wood is hard enough now and new buds are swelling so rose fertiliser or old stable manure will be great for roses right now.

Prune grape vines now while the nights are at their coldest. Prune back side laterals and all surplus growth, (leaders and laterals not required on established vines.

Turn your compost now and add moisture if the pile is dry, when it is saturated cover with straw, old carpet or plastic to maintain heat.

The vegetable garden is still growing, plant broad beans and if you have a very warm spot with all day sun put in some early potatoes, cover them at night if they pop through quickly.

Cheers, Linda.