It’s slippery-leaf season again and there are two reasons why I know this. The first is that I just had a skid of cartoon-banana-skin proportions on the fallen beech leaves outside my house. The second reason is that after this week, Manchester City Council will stop their weekly emptying of our green wheelie bins, just when there is a tonne of leaves to put in them.
If you need a bit of advice on what to do with all those leaves, have a look at my blog post from last year on the subject. Here are some other tasks worth tackling, if you can dodge the raindrops:
Plant spring bulbs and herbaceous perennials
Now is the time to start planting bulbs; crocus and daffodil bulbs can start going in now; wait a little longer before planting tulips, because they are more susceptible to disease. Bulbs look best if planted in groups, and should be planted at about two to three times their own depth.
If you want to plant herbaceous perennials for next year’s displays, this month is probably your last opportunity, before the soil gets too cold for the roots to become established. A good design tip; plant herbaceous perennials in groups of three or more, to give your beds or borders some coherence. Incorporate lots of organic matter into the soil, before planting.
Store your apples correctly
If you intend to store your apples, pick the fruit with the stalks intact, and only store if healthy and undamaged. ‘Bramley’s Seedling’ and ‘Pixie’ have a good storage life, and can last up to three months if stored properly. Keep an eye on the weather forecast and pick before any hard frost is expected, or the fruit will start dropping, and get damaged.
Store apples in a rodent-free, cool, dark, slightly humid but well-ventilated place, at around 3-7 degrees centigrade. Garages, cellars and sheds may be suitable but store away from items such as paint, fertilisers, fuel and onions, because apples can be tainted by strong scents.
Store in open sided crates, shallow boxes or shelves with slatted sides, to maintain air movement around the fruit. Lay fruit stalk-side down, in single layers and not touching. Wrapping each fruit individually with newspaper can prolong storage, but makes it difficult to check the fruit regularly for any signs of disease or spoilage. Discard any rotten fruit immediately.
Rhubarb
I planted three new crowns of rhubarb at the beginning of this year. One crown in particular has made exceptional progress, but I have resisted the temptation to harvest any.
This is apparently the ‘done thing’ in the first year, to enable the plants to get really well established. I shall wait for the leaves to die off naturally, before cutting the stems to the ground; have a thorough weeding session, and then apply a mulch around the crowns.
Keep on tidying…
Continue to tidy up any perennials that have finished flowering, but if the foliage is still green, leave it until it is blackened by the frost. Try and tidy fallen leaves out of beds and borders, to prevent them harbouring slugs or rotting the crowns of other herbaceous perennials. Cut or shred any dead, woody growth into small pieces as you remove it, before putting it on the compost heap; this will help it break down more quickly.