Garden Tips for September

Planting

• Sow poppy seeds.
• Milkweed seeds can be sown now to support monarch butterfly larvae next spring and summer.
• Daffodil bulbs planted every other week until November will extend their blooming time next spring.
• Plant cyclamen, primrose, euryops, violas, snapdragons, and calendulas now for holiday color in December.
• Begin transplanting lettuces to beds and continue to do so every two weeks.
• Transplant nursery-grown winter vegetables.
  
  

Maintenance

• Fertilize winter vegetable crops with a top dressing of compost or an evenly-balanced fertilizer.
• Start removing and redirecting tired, disease-free summer vegetable plants to the compost pile. Renew vegetable beds with compost to feed the soil for next season.
• Dig, divide, and replant overgrown perennials as they finish blooming. Weed beds, add compost, and replant.
• Dethatch and aerate lawn.
  
  

Pest and disease control

• Use row covers to keep cabbage loopers, aphids, and whiteflies from winter vegetable crops.
• Keep diseased plants out of compost pile.
• Hand pick or vacuum remaining insect pests in the garden.
• Look for tomato hornworms early in the morning and at dusk, when they are chomping on plants.
• Net grapes from marauding birds. Hanging mylar strips or old CDs to reflect light and startle birds can cut down on fruit loss.