Smooth the transition from summer into autumn with prudent nips and tucks, and harvest and store the last of the summer bounty
How to let nature do the sowing
In nature, plants drop their seeds as they become ripe. These seeds then sit on the soil and wait until the season and conditions are right for them to germinate. They’re not collected, labelled and stored away in an envelope until the right time of year. Save yourself a job and try mimicking nature – though it’s a good idea to collect a few seeds
to share and swap with friends.
Poppies with plump, dry seed heads can be pulled out of the ground and shaken directly onto the desired area. Other flowers – Queen Anne’s lace, cornflower, calendula and nigella among
them – can be left in the garden until the seed heads are very dry, then the whole head can be snipped off, laid on the ground and left to germinate. This natural seed-dispersal technique makes the
most of nature’s wonderful ability to grow, while allowing you to choose where the seed will sprout.
Chores
What’s where
Draw a map of your perennial bed before everything is cut back and hard to identify in the winter. This will make shifting, planting and dividing plants in the coming months much easier as you can refer back to your map. It doesn’t have to be pretty, or even hugely accurate – just a shape for each plant with a number next to it, and a corresponding name below. No more digging into your sleeping winter bed to plant a salvia and finding you’ve just put your spade through a clump of delphiniums.
Get it in
Plant spring bulbs. Beetroot, carrot, broccoli, silverbeet, lettuce and other salad greens and leeks can all be planted now. Sow coriander seeds directly. To help prevent bolting, situate the herb out of the noon sun – in the shade of taller crops such as silverbeet is a good spot.
Snip, snap
Dead head roses to encourage the final blooms before winter.
Bountiful
Keep on top of harvesting your summer bounty. Bottle, freeze, and make sauces and chutneys. The onslaught of tomatoes and courgettes is almost over, so pick your toms and put them straight into ice-cream containers in the freezer to be used later, while courgettes can be chopped up and frozen on trays to be used in baking.
Fruit loop
Once fruiting is finished, stone fruit trees can be pruned for shape and size, removing any dead or diseased branches. Pruning in the summer when the branches are leaf-laden reduces the available energy that the tree can put into its root system, consequently slowing growth, which helps to maintain a manageable-sized tree. There is still time to thin the fruit on your apple and pear trees. They can sometimes overproduce, and if not removed, the quality and size of the apples will be affected.
H2O
Keep up watering. Plants need to be well hydrated now so they don’t go into autumn water-stressed, and therefore susceptible to diseases, and weak in the face of winter’s frosts. A thick layer of pea straw or other mulch helps keep moisture in the soil.
Landscaping 101 – outdoor baths
A shady, hidden area of the garden that might otherwise be overlooked is a great spot for one of life’s special joys – bathing outdoors. Choose a secluded, level site for the bath with good drainage – you don’t want the water to pool and become a breeding ground for mosquitoes.
Glowing embers under your tub might sound charmingly rustic, but the reality is a lukewarm soak while your rump gets a roasting, and in residential areas this probably won’t be permitted – not to mention that a fire would limit you to a metal bathtub.
If your bath is close to your house, the easiest bet for heating the water is a hose hooked up to a hot tap. Otherwise, and for a more permanent set-up, opt for a califont water heater attached to a fence or post. The cover for the gas tank can double up as a side table (for your drinks, books or whatever) and the califont itself can be obscured with climbers. Star jasmine and wisteria have the added bonus of having a great night-time scent, and plants with white flowers and silvery foliage look fabulous when glowing in the dark. There are options available for every microclimate and situation.
Lighting will make your bath a 24-hour event. We’re thinking dark, leafy, softly lit. Enter solar lights. Of the mountains of these available, we have a soft spot for colour-changing orbs, nestled among the flora. Solar uplights are also very effective, especially when shining into overhead trees or illuminating the shrubbery. For a romantic scene, flame is unbeatable – a candle or two in glass jars or lamps. All that’s left now is to choose your playlist and slide in.
Consider this: fruit picker
A fruit picker can put an end to scaling ladders, perching precariously on branches or desperately shaking trunks.
This tool is especially useful for collecting the bounty from large fruit trees. It comprises a long pole with a wire collection basket attached to one end. The fruit is nudged with the claw-like edge
of the basket, into which it falls unharmed, meaning less bruising on the harvest and safer for you. Fruit pickers are available as a standalone tool, with or without the pole. You can also buy
the basket as an attachment compatible with branded pole pruners, such as Fiskars and Gardena.
Fiskars fruit picker, $39.98, from Mitre 10
Steal this look
The look is sophisticated, modern and moody. The considered palette is muted, comprising very dark grey joinery, lighter fawny-grey coverings, a silvering wooden deck, and silver and green foliage. The contrasting white and black cushions provide a stark yet welcoming focal point and echo the configurations of the surrounding nature, whose own patterns are reflected in the windows. The furniture’s fine wooden legs are also a link between design and nature and can be read as stylised twigs.
The clean lines of the architecture and furniture are in agreeable contrast to the softening effects of the foliage – being medium-sized, this forms an intricate pattern without appearing fussy. Sited close to the house and sitting area, the trees add to the intimacy of the setting and to its privacy, yet never appear overbearing. Evergreen native trees and shrubs would work well, such as bright-green griselinia and silver corokia.
Words by: Mary Lovell-Smith
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