In your vegetable garden in September

September can be a wonderful month in the vegetable garden, when the weather is kind enough to allow the final ripening of pumpkins, drying beans and onions, before they go in to store. On the other hand, it may be wet and miserable. In which case you will need to find somewhere dry and airy to finish off the drying process.Some areas will see frosts, cutting short the final pickings from tender tomatoes, beans and courgettes. One season comes to a close, while another opens. Winter salads, Brussels sprouts, broccoli and so on are just a month or two away.

Things to do in the vegetable garden this month

• 
  Asparagus beetle
• If you haven’t already done so, make a plan of your vegetable plot, noting what is growing where. This will be really helpful when planning for next year, particularly in terms of crop rotation.
• If your asparagus foliage is turning brown it is time to cut it down (watch out for spines). Remove debris from around the crowns to discourage over wintering asparagus beetle. Mulch with well-rotted garden compost. If you are planning to plant new asparagus plants next year prepare the beds by adding grit, especially if your soil is poorly drained.
• Too many green tomatoes for chutney?
  If you’ve got loads of green fruits on your outdoor tomatoes, don’t let them go to waste. With help they may yet still ripen. Pull up the plants, then either
  -  hang them upside down in a greenhouse or shed
  or
  -  lay the plants on straw and cover with cloches
  Another option is to pick the fruits and put them in a brown paper bag, or a drawer. Add a ripe apple or banana to speed up the ripening. 
  
  It is quite safe to compost
  blighted tomato plants in a
  normal compost heap, but
  don’t add infected fruits
• Curing blighted tomatoes?
  Seemingly healthy green fruit picked from blighted plants often develops blight as it ripens. Dr David Shaw of the Savari Research Trust has found a way of “curing” fruit from blighted plants, so that they ripen normally without developing symptoms. Blight stops growing at around 25°C, so he kept polythene bags of green fruit (variety ‘Sungold’) in an incubator at 40°C. Preliminary experiments showed that a treatment period of 12 hours or more seemed enough to kill the disease, and allow the fruit to ripen normally over the next few days. More work is needed to see if this treatment is successful on all strains of blight and all varieties of tomato. But how do you provide this sort of temperature for 12 hours? Dr Shaw used a poultry incubator, but suggests it might be possible to adapt an insulated tank of water, with the tomatoes in a sealed plastic bag..

• 
  Globe artichoke
  (Ray Spence)
  
  
  Keep picking runner beans
  Harvest the last of your globe artichokes, cutting only the buds that have not started to open yet.
• Keep picking runner beans, French beans, courgettes and cucumbers regularly to prolong the harvest period up to the first frosts.
• Now is the time to start  thinking about storing carrots, parsnips, celeriac, beetroot, turnip, swede, kohlrabi, horseradish and  salsify for the winter. It can be easiest to leave them in the ground for as long as possible – but if it is more convenient to have them close to home, or pests, diseases and frozen ground are a problem, then lifting and storing is the answer. Our Storing the harvest factsheet will tell you more.
• Parsnips are better left in the ground, as they taste better after the first frosts.
• Lift all  potatoes as soon as possible, particulary where slugs are active. Leave the tubers out to dry for a day or two before storing (indoors if the weather is wet).  Store only undamaged ones, in a dark frost-free place, in paper sacks tied at the neck. There is no hurry to reduce the temperature of potatoes immediately after harvest. Temperatures between 10-15 °C promote the development of a layer of protective corky tissue on the skin, and the healing of any minor wounds. After 2-3 weeks move them to a cooler spot, at temperatures between 5-10 °C
• Potato sacks are available from the Organic Gardening Catalogue.
• Lift any remaining onions and shallots for storage once the foliage has turned brown. Dry in a warmish spot until the skins are ‘rustle’ dry then store in a cool, well ventilated place

• Earthing up
  Earth up trench grown celery for the final time, leaving just the foliage poking out of the trench. Harvest the last of the self-blanching celery before the frosts begin.
  Earth up celeriac ‘bulbs’, to protect against early frosts, and leeks to increase the length of blanched stem if you like a longer white part to your leeks..
  Use dry, crumbly soil when earthing up.
• Winter soil protection with green manures
  There is still time to sow some green manures for a winter cover crop.

Why green manure?

• Prevent loss of soil nutrients over the winter.
• Protect the structure of the soil
• Boost  fertility

Choose a suitable green manure from the table below. Remember to consult your crop rotation plans before you decide.

• Green manure seeds , and 'Green manures for organic soil improvement' a useful booklet that tells you how to use them, are available from the Organic Gardening Catalogue
  
  Garden Organic members can see our Get Started Guide to Green Manures.
  
  Access to this guide requires members' password.
  Find out more about Garden Organic membership. Non-members please can call 024-7630-8215 for a free copy.
  
  

  Phacelia (Phacelia tanacetifolia)

  Field beans (Vicia fabia)

  Tares (Vicia sativa)

  Winter Green manures at a glance

  Plant	Type	Fixer or Lifter?	Sowing time	Place in rotation
  Field beans	HA	Fixer	Sept-Nov	Pea and beans section
  Fodder Radish	HB	Lifter	Aug-Sept	Cabbage section
  Grazing rye	HA	Lifter	Aug-Oct	Anywhere, except where small seeded crops are to be direct sown next spring
  Tares	HA	Lifter	Mar-Sept	Pea and bean section; excellent where cabbage family are to grow next season
  Phacelia	HHA	Lifter	Mar-Sept	Anywhere.

  
  HA    - hardy annual
  HHA - young plants can be fairly frost hardy, but not reliably frost hardy
  HB   - hardy biennial
  ‘Lifter’ – stores soil nutrients over winter
  ‘Fixer’ – takes up nitrogen from the air.

Sowing and Planting

• Slug alert
  Slugs can be a real problem in a warm wet autumn. The most effective treatment at this time of year is the parasitic nematode, Nemaslug, which is watered on to the soil. Do this as soon as possible while soil temperatures are above 10°C.
  Nemaslug is available from the Organic Gardening Catalogue until the end of September

• Keep on sowing

  Continue to sow fast maturing autumn crops such as spring cabbage, spinach, turnips, and oriental vegetables. Plant  overwintering onion sets. Use cloches, cold frames, greenhouses and polytunnels to maintain growth in cooler areas.

  Overwintering onions	Onion sets are on sale now for planting until November. Radar, Senshyu Yellow and Keepwell F1 are some of the varieties available. Tips for planting: A well-drained soil will give best results Suggested spacing is 10 -15 cm apart in rows 30 - 40 cm apart, or an equidistant spacing of 20 -25 cm.  Set up bird scarers, and/or cover the onion patch with net. Remove once the onions have put down sufficient roots to anchor themselves in the soil
  Garlic	Buy garlic for planting in October or early November. Plant named varieties of garlic, rather than using left over cloves bought from the greengrocer. This will avoid the risk of introducing disease, and help ensure you are growing a variety suited to the UK. Garlic can also be planted in early spring, but will give much better yields if it goes through a cold period over winter. Thermidrome and Printanor are available from the Organic Gardening Catalogue
  Land cress	Also known as American cress. An excellent substitute for watercress and is very hardy.
  Rocket	Although known principally as a summer salad, a September sowing of rocket will last well into the autumn and sometimes survive the winter in mild conditions or with some protection. The cooler temperatures at this time of year discourage rocket from going to seed so quickly.
  Chinese leaves	Mizuna There is a great choice of oriental salads to sow now to give a supply of salad or stir-fry leaves over the autumn and winter. Some (marked* below) are best with some protection, and all will crop more generously under cover. If you are not sure what you like, try Oriental Saladini - a mixture of various greens. Oriental Saladini, Mizuna*, Mibuna*, Giant Red Mustard*, Indian mustard, Pak choi*.
  Lamb's lettuce	Also called corn salad, lamb's lettuce is a very hardy winter salad with a soft texture and mild flavour. Lasts well throughout the winter, and when it flowers next spring the flowers can be eaten too.
  Winter lettuce	Slower and less reliable perhaps than the salads listed above. Use a winter variety such as Wendel, Rouge d'Hiver, Winter Density or Winter Crop. for harvesting in November and December.
  Winter purslane	Goes by the additional names of claytonia and miner's lettuce. Another very hardy winter salad, good at self seeding. Produces small, mild tasting, succulent leaves. Sow direct until end of the month.

• New potatoes for Christmas

  If you have some tubers left from a crop of early potatoes, put them in a light, frost-free place. When they start to shoot, plant 3 into a 15 litre tub with drainage holes. Place tubers onto a 15cm (6in) layer of multipurpose or potting compost, cover with 7.5cm (3in) of compost.

• As the shoots grow, fill the container with compost, always leaving the top of the shoots in the light. Water regularly, support the foliage with canes and protect from frost. Empty the container on Christmas morning (no peeping before!) and harvest the new tubers.

  Garden Organic members can view our fact sheet, Growing potatoes in containers.
  
  Note: To access the factsheets online you need to be a Garden Organic member. Find out about Garden Organic membership here.

Harvesting

• 
  Expose squash fruits
  to the sun
  What you could be eating now
  - if you remembered to sow it.

  Aubergine Beetroot Broad beans Cabbage Calabrese Carrots Cauliflower (autumn) Celery Chard Chicory Courgettes Cucumber (outdoors and in) Endive French beans Globe artichokes Garlic

  Kohl rabi Lettuce Leaf beet Marrow Onions Onions, salad Parsley Peas Potatoes (maincrop) Radish Runner beans Shallots Spinach Summer squash Sweetcorn Tomatoes

• Protect squashes that will be harvested in October from rotting by placing a board or tile under the developing fruit to keep it off the soil. Expose the fruits to the sun for maximum ripening by pulling back or removing leaves that are shading the squash or pumpkin. Keep a watch out for frost, which will damage the fruit. After harvesting, store pumpkins in a dry, airy place; ideal temperature is 10-15°C.

Large cabbage white
caterpillars on nasturtium.
( Copyright Ray Spence)


Leek rust

Pest and disease watch

• Brassica whitefly can build up over the summer and survive the winter on Brussels sprouts, broccoli, winter cabbage and kale. The tiny, white creatures fly up in clouds when the plants are disturbed.The sticky honeydew they produce often encourages black ‘sooty’ moulds to grow on the leaves. Pick off infested lower leave; the young whitefly ‘scales’ live underneath these leaves.  Spray with insecticidal soap if the infestation is  bad. Spray both sides of the leaves, repeating two or three times at intervals if necessary.
  
• Mealy cabbage aphids can also be build up on winter brassica crops.
• Continue to keep a watch for cabbage caterpillars, and pick off any that you see.
• Leek rust - a fungal disease of leeks. Red/orange pustules develop on the leaves and stems. In a mild autumn the disease may continue to develop turning leaves yellow and resulting in reduction of plant size.
  For information on prevention and control, Garden Organic members can refer to our Leek rust factsheet
• Put out slug traps around new sowings and plantings - preferably a week or two before sowing or planting.

Garden friends

• 
  Stacked logs make a good home
  for hibernating frogs
• A pile of stacked logs makes a good home for hibernating frogs, toads and newts. They like to retreat into the crevices as the weather starts to turn cold, ready to emerge in the spring to hunt down slugs and other pests.
• Provide water for birds, they are excellent pest control helpers.
• Make a wildlife habitat for your garden with help from our schools factsheet Building a wildlife habitat 
• A range of hibernation boxes, including the lacewing chamber and a hedgehog box are available from the Organic Gardening Catalogue.
• Keep track of what was growing where for your crop rotation - before harvesting write down where crops were so that you can refer back to your notes next spring before planting. This will prevent build up of pests and diseases and help to maintain fertility.
  See our factsheet on crop rotation
  
  Note: To access the factsheets you will need the members' password. Find out about Garden Organic membership here.

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