To do on your plot in August

Harvest

  • French Beans
  • Runner Beans
  • Cabbage
  • Carrots
  • Cauliflower
  • Celery
  • Courgettes
  • Cucumbers
  • Kale
  • Kohlrabi
  • Lettuce
  • Onions
  • Spring Onions
  • Peas
  • Early Maincrop Potatoes
  • Radish
  • Spinach
  • Tomatoes
  • Turnips

When you harvest your potatoes take care to remove all the tubers. Any left will not only sprout next year and become a weed but will also be a reservoir for disease and potato blight spores.

Sowing, Planting and Cultivating

Sowing

There are still quite a few things you can sow in August.

  • Spring Cabbage
  • Chinese cabbage
  • Kohlrabi
  • Lettuce (sow a hardy variety for winter use)
  • Spring Onions (White Lisbon winter hardy)
  • Radishes
  • Spinach
  • Turnips

Planting Out

August is the month to plant out:

  • Savoy Cabbages and Cauliflowers
  • Kale

Cultivating

Runner beans that have reached the top of their supports will benefit from having the growing tip pinched out.

Keep on top of the weeds, it really is far easier to hoe them as small seedlings than as grown plants.

Keep your tomato sideshoots in check, you want tomatoes not masses of foliage. Ensure they are watered regularly, drying out prevents the plant from taking up sufficient calcium and the deficit causes blossom end rot.

Keep feeding your tomatoes.

Fruit

Many fruits are ready to harvest or swelling. Swelling fruit requires a lot of water so ensure they have enough.

Finish summer pruning apple trees and prune mature plums after fruiting.

Plant new strawberry plants and pot up runners from established plants.

General Tasks

Keep on top of the pests. Aphids and Blackfly are a particular problem. You can control them with pesticides or just wash them off many plants with a strong jet of water. A wash with soft soap will do no harm to the plants and will reduce numbers.

Turn your compost. The warmth will be helping your compost break down and turning it out to in will ensure even breakdown. Water if it is dry as the microbes need some water but don’t make it absolutely sodden.

Keep an eye on your brassicas for butterfly eggs and caterpillars, these will most probably be under the leaves.