To do on your plot in June

Harvest

Salad crops should be available, lettuce, spring onion, radish etc, Summer cabbage and early carrots.

The early potatoes will be coming in this month as well as Beetroot, young turnips and summer spinach. Early peas could well be cropping in June.

Sowing, Planting and Cultivating

Cultivating

As with May, we really need to keep on top of the weeds. Hoeing them off as small seedlings will make the job far easier than waiting for them to grow and send their roots down.

Continue thinning out your carrots, parsnips, beetroot etc. Water when required.

In very dry weather, keeping the surface friable by hoeing will help keep the water from getting to the surface by capillary action and then evaporating away. It also helps water soak in when you do get some rain.

Planting

You should be able to plant out brassicas now. Broccoli and calabrese, Brussels sprouts, summer cabbage.

If you have started beans in pots, both runner and French these can go into the outside too. Leeks may well be ready to move to their final position. Celery can go out now as well.

Outdoor tomatoes can go to their final position now. When moving plants from greenhouse to outdoors it is a good idea to condition them to the move. Take them out in the day and put them back at night for a few days or move from greenhouse to coldframe. This avoids shocking the plant by a sudden and drastic change in climate.

Sowing

There is a lot to sow this month and with many crops you can sow one set and then a few weeks later re-sow to give you a succession of fresh vegetables. In dry weather it is a good idea to soak your seed drill before sowing and then just water with a fine rose after.

  • French and Runner Beans
  • Maincrop peas
  • Beetroot
  • Carrots
  • Turnips
  • Swedes
  • Cauliflowers
  • Chicory
  • Endive
  • Kohlrabi
  • Sweetcorn
  • Squash
  • Courgette and Marrows
  • Cucucumber

In the greenhouse

Keep pinching off the side shoots with your tomatoes and keep an eye out for pests such as aphids, whitefly, red spider mite. If you are subject to attack by these pests it is worth checking out biological controls as these are perfectly safe to use and, used correctly, more effective than traditional chemical controls. Many of the chemical controls of the past are no longer available anyway so the organic alternatives are now the mainstream choice.

Fruit

Make sure your fruiting plants have sufficient water when the fruit is swelling. This is critical to a good crop.

Thin out plums and apples in June.

General Tasks

Slugs and snails are at ground level so take action to keep them down and remember birds will eat your crops. Don’t forget the netting.

The butterflies are about now as well so check the undersides of your brassica leaves for the yellow or white eggs that will hatch into caterpillars and devastate the plant. You can squash them, wipe or wash them off easily at this stage.