Thank goodness for Silverbeet - it kept us going through the cool spring gap between winter and summer veges! And this rainbow chard provided delicious colour as well. October is probably one of the busiest months of the year for the garden especially towards the end of the month with Labour weekend being the great traditional NZ planting weekend. If you are into sowing seeds then most things can be sown this month provided you have a warm place to start off the more tender ones such as tomatoes etc. As you sow your first lot of seeds, kick off your succession planting cycle by purchasing some punnets of well grown plants from your local garden centre or store and get them into the ground.
Succession
planting is the practice of staggering your sowing or planting over the growing
season. We do this for a number of reasons, but mainly so that you don’t have your
crops all ripening at once. You want to avoid that in the family vegetable
garden especially with crops you can’t store or preserve. A good rule of thumb is to sow or plant every
4-5 weeks or so. If you have raised
plants in trays, sow the next lot of seed the same day you plant out your
seedlings.
My
garden is now well into it’s Year 2 on the crop rotation plan. For me this
means I have broad beans sown last season in Bed 1 and broad beans sown this
season in Bed 2 – so there is a little bit of a cross over going on! Not for long though as I have planted green
leafy veges in gaps in Bed 1 and will be planting as soon as the beans have
finished harvesting. The silverbeet, lettuces and brassicas will all be very
happy with the nitrogen fixed by all those legumes. Keep sowing peas and you can now get in your
French beans and runner beans. Look out for last year’s perennial runner beans
coming up in their permanent spot. A sure sign of time to plant. Scarlett
runners do best when sown in double rows 20cm apart with 15 cm between plants.
They will grow very tall 2-3m. Get dwarf
and main crop beans in now too. If you
have not already limed the beds then add a bit of lime now.
Pototoes
– just keep planting if you have the room. A row of early potatoes for summer
is better than none! Seed potatoes are
still available in the shops. Sow
carrots, beetroot and parsnip in friable soil.
Liquid feed garlic, onions, leeks etc.
Labour
Weekend is the traditional time for planting out tomatoes and its friends,
capsicum, basil, chillies, auburgine, courgettes etc. Very exciting. There have been plants in the
shops since mid September though which seems early, particularly for the south.
So if warm enough, get these plants in and keep up the water and liquid feed.
Jobs for this Month
Sow:
Peas, beetroot, swedes, turnips, lettuce,
carrots, parsnips, parsley, broccoli, brussel sprouts, cabbage, cauli, leeks,
silverbeet.
Sow
under cover in a warm space: tomatoes, capsicum, pumpkin, courgettes, cucumber,
celery, sweet corn, beans
Plant:
Punnets of brassicas, celery, peas, leeks, silverbeet, lettuce, potatoes,
asparagus.
Cultivate:
Keep any weeds at bay with regular hoeing and mulching. Liquid feed growing
plants at least fortnightly especially your garlic crop.
Harvest:
Broad beans, silverbeet, asparagus, lettuce etc