May 2024
Hopefully this month we will get some better weather and be able to catch up with the jobs delayed by the wet weather of previous months. In the vegetable garden French beans, runner beans, sweetcorn can be planted if they were sown indoors in April or you can sow outside now. Fortnightly sowings of salad crops are vital to keep on top of your salad supplies.
May is the time to do the Chelsea Chop. About the 3 rd week in May you cut the tall late flowering herbaceous plants back by half to save you having to stake them. They will make more flowers though they will flower a little later. If the fear of frost is over tender bedding can be planted towards the end of the month.
I hope you will continue to do the ‘No Mow May’ on your lawns. It will help strengthen the grass as well as supply pollinating insects with a supply of useful flowers.
Early flowering shrubs like forsythia, ribes and winter flowering viburnums can now be pruned to encourage new shoots to flower next year. Clematis Armandii can also be pruned back to keep it controlled. Always look out for any birds nests in trees, shrubs, climbers and hedges that you wish to do any pruning on. Leave the nests alone and do any pruning after July/August when hopefully the young will have fledged.
Enjoy your Garden
Geoff Hawkins.