Tom Strowlger

@garden_with_tom

We have arrived in meteorological Autumn and can hopefully look back on Summertime with happy and fond memories. Autumn brings ever shortening and cooler days but also the chance of late sun and warmth which we can enjoy whilst doing our gardening jobs.

We can spend time cutting back any untidy brown foliage and getting the garden Autumn ready. We should take a moment to delight in any late summer flowers as we turn the page on that season and get ready for early Autumn gardening jobs.

We want annual and perennial Summer flowers to extend their floral display as far into Autumn as possible, to do this we should deadhead as many spent flowers as we can. This will ensure the plants concentrate their efforts and energy on any new buds and flowers. A snip of a deadhead here and there can give our summer plants a last push of colour. We should do the same to our hanging baskets to keep them both tidy and colourful before we take them down until next year.

The summer takes its toll on the garden lawn, so now is a very good time to lay new turf and sow grass seed whilst the soil remains warm and with nights becoming cooler and damper it gives us the perfect conditions for seeds to germinate and roots to take. We can ensure our lawns look thick and presentable before the Autumn turns to Winter. The growth of established grass starts to slow this month so we should now be cutting the lawn on the highest lawnmower setting as we want the grass to have plenty of leaf to stay healthy in Autumn and Winter.

We can get very excited about planting spring bulbs and start to plan and order our favourite spring bulbs, starting with crocuses, daffodils and hyacinths. We can plant the new bulbs into pots, beds and borders, with spring bulbs it is certainly the more planted the better. We want to make our spring gardens as colourful and green as possible. To give the bulbs plenty of time to establish let’s use this month to start planting spring bulbs.

This month is ideal for preparing for all the future falling brown leaves, so we can set about building a new compost. Ideally a compost will be a self-enclosed environment made from old planks of wood or pallets opposed to just being a heap of leaves, we want the leaves to stay in one place and breakdown into a mulch that we can use on our borders and beds next year.

I love to see the changing colours and browning leaves that the Autumn months bring with it. We are watching our gardens and natural world transition from green growth to the slow pace towards dormancy. I always treat September as a hangover month of summertime, a month with one leg in the past Summer season and one leg in the coming Autumn season. 

Please do follow me on Instagram @garden_with_tom for more seasonal gardening advice and tips.