Keep up yields on your crops

Make the most of what you’ve grown so far by managing crops well

High summer is all about surveying your hard work on your fruit and veg patch, enjoying the satisfaction of a job well done through the year, harvesting plenty of lovely produce – but also managing crops well as they continue to grow so they reach their potential.

Keep up the harvesting and get creative in the kitchen to use up gluts – see our ‘Home Grown’ page in Garden News each week to get some great ideas. You can also start saving veg seed for next year from your plants now they’re flowering and fruiting.

Keep an eye on anything amiss – pest damage, dry compost, weed growth – and tend to them little and often so the jobs don’t seem like chores. And water well.

Tomatoes, squash and other fruiting crops need continual feeding every week. Always write down when you feed your plants as before you know it it’ll have been longer than it should have been since you last gave them a feed.

If all this fertiliser is a strain on your wallet, think about making your own comfrey tea now, which is a rich source of nutrients and completely free if you grow it in your garden. Rot down its chopped leaves in a lidded container with some water for a few weeks.

Best of all, try to sit in and enjoy your garden in summer – you spend a lot of time on it, so relax and take pleasure in its charms in high season.