September is a season of abundance and a season of winding down into a new phase in the garden. Enjoy the fruits of your own labor and allow yourself to enjoy the days outside.
Whether you are harvesting leafy greens , allowing pumpkins ripen or just sitting on the rear deck with a glass of tea, September is the month to enjoy your bounty and soak in the very last days of summer and the very first days of autumn. This is the time when those days are not too hot and not too cold, but just right. Don’t let them pass you by!
Amy Renea
Cool-Season Crops Get Their Chance
With the children back to college and also the temperatures dipping just a little, it is time to initiate the autumn harvest and count on cool-season plants. Broccoli, kale and a second set of peas would be the newest kids on the block this month in the garden.
Amy Renea
King of the garden at this time is chard, which range in colors from brilliant yellows, reds and pinks into the classic giant white. I maintain snipping at those leaves of chard for smoothies that are green and the plants continue producing. If spinach gets eaten up by bugs in your garden or visit seed too fast, attempt chard all summer and fall for a great alternative.
Amy Renea
Vining Plants Have Their Time in the Sun
If you look closely below those large leaves of pumpkins and other types of squash, you will notice green fruit growing at an incredible speed. Some may be eaten green since you would summer squash (attempt acorn squash this manner ) while others are best left to ripen on the vine. Jarrahdale pumpkins, the blue-skinned heirlooms, are my favorite hearty pumpkin this season.
Amy Renea
If you’ve got more gourds than you understand what to do with, go ahead and let them grow to maturity. Set them aside to dry all winter and you’ll have the perfect house for birds next spring.
Amy Renea
Get Plants Ready for Winter
Hanging ferns, window box plantings and annuals might start to brown by the end of this month. Go ahead and let them stay outside until the day temps start hovering in the low 40s. If frost seems imminent, it’s best to receive them inside, but outside is best as long as possible if you are going to overwinter your favorites.
Amy Renea
Succulents also need a close attention this time of year. Some can overwinter outside, but tropical succulents will need to come inside at the first sign of frost. These plants can endure a very light frost, but chilly temperatures may kill off the very best growth. A wilted aloe vera isn’t a wonderful sight, so get them inside if temperatures fall.
Matthew Cunningham Landscape Design LLC
One Last Hurrah for your Garden
The final of the summertime are winding down, for instance, gorgeous areas of echinacea and most of those purple-spiked plants. Permit the seed heads to develop to feed the birds to sow for the next season’s garden. Alternatively, chop those heads off should you hate the appearance of drying seed heads. (Just try to hide from the lingering gazes of birds when you really do: They need those seeds)
Amy Renea
Old Plants Refresh the Garden
September is a great time to start bulking up the compost bin. You will have a large number of spent annuals to toss in the heap, husks and cobs of sweet corn and much more leaves than you can shake a stick at. Be certain that you use them. If you don’t have time to earn a correct mulch bin, then just pile everything in a rear corner of the yard and let nature take over. By spring, you’ll be astonished the way the heap has reduced and changed to a crumbly brown soil change.
Amy Renea
If you are lucky, you might be harvesting a second harvest of strawberries. Go ahead and enjoy a few, but leave the majority of them on so the plant begins its descent to dormancy.
Amy Renea
So enjoy the past few blossoms of summer and enjoy eating the bounty you’ve worked for many summer. Start placing the garden to break and recycle all those plants, for next year will come sooner than you think. Whatever you decide to spend your time , do it outside and make the most of these gorgeous early fall days.