Gardening Jobs for August
There’s a particular feel to August that arrives before the calendar does — webs strung across the path first thing, seedheads rattling where flowers were, the light going gold a little earlier each evening. The garden has done most of what it’s going to do this year, and honestly, so have you. This is the month to sit in it.
But a handful of small jobs done now pay for themselves twice over: once in flowers that keep coming through September, and again next spring. I’ve kept this list deliberately short. August is for holidays and long evenings, not guilt, so these are the jobs I’ll genuinely be doing rather than everything the books say you could.
Keep the show going
- Deadhead dahlias every few days and they’ll flower until the frosts. If you’re unsure which is a spent head and which is a bud about to open, the spent ones are pointed and cone-shaped, the buds are round. It took me an embarrassingly long time to learn this.
- Cut hardy geraniums and other early perennials right back to the ground, water them well, and most will give you a fresh mound of leaves and a second flush of flowers.
- Pots and hanging baskets are running on empty by now. Keep watering daily, deadhead as you go, and add a tomato feed every fortnight — it will carry them well into autumn.
Think about next spring (briefly)
- Order spring bulbs now, while the good varieties are still in stock. Narcissi and alliums can go in from September; tulips prefer to wait until November, but they won’t wait for you to order them.
- On a dry day, collect seed from aquilegias, nigella, poppies and sweet peas. Paper bags, not plastic, and label them immediately — every gardener has a drawer of mystery envelopes to prove what happens otherwise.
- Sow a few hardy annuals before the month is out and they’ll overwinter as sturdy little plants, flowering weeks earlier next year than anything spring-sown.
Prune, but lightly
- Summer prune apples, both trained and free-standing, to let light into the fruit and encourage flowering wood for next year.
- Trim lavender once the bees have finished with it, taking the flower stalks and a little of the leafy growth — but never cut into the bare wood, because it rarely forgives you.
- Shorten the long whippy shoots on wisteria to five or six leaves, and take out a third of the flowered stems on rambling roses, tying in the rest.
Water where it counts
Established borders can largely fend for themselves, even when they look martyred. Spend your water on containers, anything planted this year, and the vegetable patch — ideally in the early morning or evening, and ideally from the butt rather than the tap. Keep ponds and water features topped up too; this is the month wildlife needs them most.
If you have a meadow
Once the wildflowers have dropped their seed, cut or strim the lot. Leave the cuttings lying for a couple of days so the last seeds shake out, then rake everything off. Don’t be tempted to leave the cuttings as mulch — meadows want poor soil, and that’s half the secret.
And the not-to-dos
- Don’t cut the flowerheads off ornamental grasses. They’re about to become the best thing in the winter garden.
- Don’t worry about a browned lawn. It isn’t dead, it’s resting, and it will green up with the September rain.
- Don’t take on any big planting or replanting projects in the heat. Whatever it is will establish far better in autumn, and you’ll enjoy August more.
Before you go away
Ask a neighbour to pick the sweet peas, beans and courgettes while you’re gone — picking is what keeps them producing, so it’s a favour to both of you. Group your pots together in the shade, water everything deeply the morning you leave, and then stop thinking about it. The garden managed long before us. It will manage for a fortnight.