The Occasional Gardener: Work in the garden doesn't end in autumn -and top of Sarah Marriott's 'to do' list is planting green manure
I used to think the end of summer meant an end to working in the garden for another year. Little did I know that there's always something to be done - which is a good excuse to get out and potter around, enjoying the last few bright days before winter sets in. "Sorry, can't do the ironing/collect the kids/wash the dog - I have to sort out the garden before the winter." But one of the best things about gardening is that it often doesn't matter if you don't get round to the things on your "to do" list - there's always next year. The only "musts" are removing slugs, caterpillars and other pests so you have plants to look at next spring.
This time last year I was full of plans to take cuttings from local hedgerows - fuchsia, wild roses, hawthorns and blackberries - to grow into plants for the native hedge I would like one day. The few cuttings of fuchsia I took last year have done very well - although I failed to follow the experts' instructions and just plonked them into big pots and forgot all about them until red flowers appeared this summer. And while it's always nice to be blasé and airily tell visitors: "Oh, that old thing? Yes, grew it from a cutting," it's comforting to know that if I don't manage to take any slips soon, there's always the easy way out - ordering a native fruiting hedge from Future Forests in Co Cork.
The other main items on my autumnal aspiration list are to do with improving the soil for next year and number one is to plant green manure. I used to think this was mouldy horse dung but it's actually a plant you grow to benefit the soil.
On some organic vegetable plots, what look like weeds to the untutored eye are, in fact, a covering of clover planted specifically to keep down invasive weeds and to enrich the soil when they're dug back in after the veggies are harvested.
Unfortunately, I didn't know about this useful trick in the spring and what look like weeds surrounding my cabbages and lettuce are in fact weeds.
Green manures come in various shapes and sizes, depending on what you want them to do, what kind of soil you have and when you're going to sow the seed. This month, I'm planning on sowing the field bean seeds which have been sitting on a shelf since I failed to do anything with them last autumn. Apparently, they can be sown until November, prefer heavy soil and will put essential nitrogen into the earth. The other green manures to sow now are Hungarian grazing rye, which is particularly good for clay soils and, if you're quick, winter tares, according to a booklet published by HDRA, the UK's organic organisation.
Green manures are not just for the vegetable plot though; they're also worth putting in flower gardens. At any time of year, they improve the soil structure making it easier for flowering plants to thrive: in winter, they cover barren areas and prevent the soil from becoming waterlogged, while in the summer, they prevent weeds from invading bare areas and a small patch of flowering crimson clover or Phacelia tanacetifolia looks pretty and can attract predators for your pests.
An excursion to the coast is another must this month, to collect seaweed to put on the area which will be used for spuds next year. Thickly-layered, the seaweed will keep down weeds, rot down to put nutrients back into the soil and discourage potato-loving pests.
But first, to sow some green manure. Now, where did I put those field bean seeds?
• Future Forests, Bantry, Co Cork, tel 027-66176. Website: www.futureforests.net
• Green manure seeds are available from Fruit Hill Farm, Co Cork, tel 027-50710, and the Organic Centre, Co Leitrim, tel 071-9854338, which also sells the HDRA booklet on green manures.
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