Events in July:

- Hampton Court Palace Flower Show - 8 to 13 July 2008. Click here for information

July's reader queries answered by Stephen Anderton, The Times. Click here to read

Week 1:

What to do this week:

- Cut back the spent flower stems of lupins.

- In warm and dry weather, top up water in garden ponds.

- Lift, divide and replant overgrown clumps of bearded irises.

- Deadhead roses, unless they are being grown for their display of autumn hips.

- Sow winter radishes in the vegetable garden.

(Neil Wormald, Sunday Times)

Weekend tips:

- Give a first clipping to hedges of beech, hornbeam, privet and leylandii. Beech and hornbeam will still make a further growth spurt, so you may wish to leave them till later if you want to clip only once. Nip out the tips of branches on new leylandii hedges to make them dense. You can also give a first clip to shapes of box, yew, phillyrea and pittosporum.

- Pull off the remaining tops of oriental poppies (the hairy, perennial ones) and fill the gap with bedding plants or adjacent flopping perennials for the rest of the season.

- Make sure clumps of phlox and eupatorium don't lack water and wilt, or the display will be greatly shortened.

- Cut down spent (and often mildewed) lupins. Tired old plants are better replaced. How about some bright modern hybrids from Westcountry Nurseries (01237 431111; www.westcountry-nurseries.co.uk)?

- Lime-green Euphorbia robbiae is a true stalwart in dry shade. Cut out the spent stems at the base now, to ensure a freshened colony next spring. Wear gloves because the sap can be a problem.

(Steven Anderton, The Times)

Q&A with Jane Owen, Times Online

Week 2:

What to do this week:

- Sow turnip seeds in the vegetable garden.

- Bend the outer leaves of summer cauliflowers over any exposed curdsto prevent sun damage.

- Once the flowering display has ended, prune back the spent stems of philadelphus.

- To prolong the flowering display, keep deadheading annual bedding plants.

(Neil Wormald, Sunday Times)

Weekend tips:

- Time to prune mock orange (philadelphus) to stop it becoming too congested. Cut out 30 to 40 per cent of the recently flowered growth to leave an open-textured crown in which the new long shoots can receive good light.

- Snap out the spent flower stems of pinks such as the heady ‘Mrs Sinkins’ and, if the plants are old, take cuttings for next year now, using new shoots pushed into a 50:50 mixture of compost and sand.

- Make sure the long wands of growth on climbing roses are tied in or shortened, before winds can rip them down.

- Summer heat means red spider mite in greenhouses.

- Ventilate well and damp down regularly. Biological controls will do the rest.

- Who is watering your patio pots while you are on holiday? Line someone up to do it or install a dripper irrigation system on a timer.

(Steven Anderton, The Times)

Q&A with Jane Owen, Times Online

Week 3:

What to do this week:

- To prolong the display, cut the flowering stems of sweet peas on a regular basis.

- Sow the seeds of Chinese cabbages in the vegetable garden.

- Once summer-fruiting raspberries have been picked, prune the spent canes to ground level.

- Cut the flower stalks of lavender for drying.

(Neil Wormald, Sunday Times)

Weekend tips:

- Wet years make sprawling perennials overlie their neighbours faster than ever; Alchemilla and geraniums such as ‘Rozanne’ and endressii are perfect examples. Cut them back with secateurs or, if you are brave, pull them off by the handful but be careful not to uproot them. After 24 hours you will hardly see that they have been disturbed. Most satisfying.

- Here’s an odd thing: cool, rainy weather mean lots of grass clippings to be composted, which means great heat in a compost bin. The heat steams off the moisture and leaves the clippings white and too dry to rot. So turn the compost with a fork and fluff it up, to let the air in, and put on a can or two of water. It will soon come to life again.

- Watch for Clematis montana eating its neighbours for breakfast. Disentangle, peel back and cut off the most wayward stems. More stems will follow, and you can do the same again, as far as September, without any loss of next spring’s flowers.

- Leaves of colchicum (autumn crocus) in beds or long grass are brown now; it’s a good time to divide old clumps before the new roots start to grow in earnest. A well-established clump of a vigorous variety can contain as many as 50 small corms, each ready for freedom and its own chance to develop.

(Steven Anderton, The Times)

Q&A with Jane Owen, Times Online

Week 4:

What to do this week:

- Sow the seeds of lamb’s lettuce (corn salad) in the vegetable garden.

- In hot weather, raise the blades on the lawn mower.

- Chervil seeds can be sown in light shade outdoors.

- Harvest onions when the leaves turn yellow and flop over.

- Remove unwanted shoots that are growing from the base of mountain ash (Sorbus aucuparia) trees.

(Neil Wormald, Sunday Times)

Weekend tips:

- Take the first spent flower-heads of buddleia, to strengthen the later ones and show them off better

- Keep your dahlias heavily staked; canes will not do. Little dahlias may look after themselves but by the end of the season, tall ones – 3ft to 6ft – will be ready to lurch or come crashing down in wind and rain

- On a dry, windy day, mow your meadow grass with a heavy-duty rotary mower, or a scythe followed by a smaller mower. Scrape up and compost every bit of the clippings, so that nothing rots down to feed the soil; flower meadows must be starved

- Cut the long, flopped flower stems off Ballota, to give you a tight grey mound once again.

(Stephen Anderton, The Times)

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Explore Gardens

• Hampton Court Palace Flower Show

• Chelsea Flower Show

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