While enriching your garden’s grass may seem beneficial for an impressive display, it is advised to avoid this practice.
Monty Don, a renowned gardening expert, has offered his insights on the matter, which could influence your garden’s future. In his recent July 2024 blog post, he mentions that the summer brings warm nights and days that encourage robust growth. However, despite the longer days aiding garden development, caution is necessary.
For those who share Monty Don’s passion for gardening, the television personality emphasizes the importance of one particular task this month. He advises that after trimming the grass, it is essential to remove all the clippings and not just leave them scattered.
Not only does it look bad – and not anything you’d love to look at – but it also affects your plants. He explains: “All Spring-flowering bulbs should have completely died back so that long grass can be cut without affecting their display next year.
“At Longmeadow we often wait until August to do this because not all wild flowers have set seed, but by the end of July most wild flower meadows can be safely cut back.
“The important thing is to remove all the grass, raking up every last piece to compost so that it will not enrich the grass and thus limit next year’s wild flower display.”
In good news for those wanting more tips, the expert set off a year ago to film the first of five programmes for ‘Monty Don’s UK Gardens’ in Scotland. He says: “A year later I have just completed the fifth, filmed in Scotland, and the completed series will be shown on BBC 2 next February.”
Talking about which fruits and veg are currently thriving this month, Monty Don adds that items like salad leaves, peas, beans, new potatoes, beetroot, garlic, carrots and artichokes, cucumbers, courgettes and tomatoes are all ones to look out for.
When it comes to when soft fruit is at its best, he states that strawberries, summer raspberries, gooseberries, black and red currants are all ready for harvest. So if you want to create a Victoria sponge for watching Wimbledon or make a scrumptious fruit salad, now is the time.