Hopefully the month of July will bring us glorious weather that allows us to be able to sit out and enjoy our gardens in between some of the jobs that need doing this month.

Here are our top gardening jobs for July;

In the veg garden

Sow fast maturing salad leaves, rocket and radishes every few weeks for continuous picking.

Harvesting the young leaves when you need them prevents plants from maturing and ensures several harvests of small, tender, mild-flavoured leaves over a long period of time. It is best to harvest leaves in the morning when they are at their freshest. Try to only harvest what you need for each day as baby leaves can wilt quickly.

Protect any fruit starting to develop by placing netting around the plants.

Use netting to protect your fruit bushes from birds and small animals. This can help to prolong the life of your produce and protect them from pests and disease. Netting is available either loose to wrap around the plants or by using canes, or by using ready made fruit cages.

Feed tomatoes, cucumbers and chili plants every week with a high potash tomato feed.

These plants require a high level of potassium in order to thrive and produce more fruit and flowers.

In the flower garden

Cut back early perennials.

Flowers such as hardy geraniums and delphiniums need to be cut back once they have flowered. By doing this, it encourages a second healthy show of flowers.

Dead head and feed roses.

You can deadhead individual flowers or clusters of flowers. The sooner you deadhead the roses, the sooner new flowers will appear, as the energy the rose is using to make rose hips will be channeled into making new flowers. When deadheading roses with single-flowers, snip off the flowerhead and around 15cm of stem, cutting just above a strong, healthy leaf. Your next flower shoot will grow from that leaf joint. Don’t forget to feed your roses too! This encourages new growth as well as more flowers.

Hoe borders regularly to keep down weeds.

Going through borders every week with a garden hoe will help keep down weeds. The action will disturb the annual weed seeds just germinating and cut off any new or fresh growth from perennial weeds. If hoeing is continued weekly, the pieces of root will eventually become exhausted and unable to produce any more shoots. Also, there’s no need to pick up weeds after hoeing, unless they have flower heads.

In and around the garden

Keep bird baths topped up during hot weather.

It’s important to keep our little garden friends hydrated just like us during the summer months.

Mow lawns at least once a week.

For regular lawns, cutting once a week is ideal, possibly upping it to two times a week when the lawn is growing its fastest, but you don’t have to stick to a strict regime. During spells of hot weather, raise the cutting height to leave the grass higher.

Keep a watch out for pests such as snails and aphids.

Don’t let these pesky creatures ruin your garden! Put down some repellent to deter them.