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Lift dahlia tubers or protect those left in the ground with a thick mulch of straw or barkSow sweet peas now for bigger, earlier blooms next yearCollect seeds and berries from shrubs and flowering plants that you want to propagateEmpty and clean out

and other plantsBring potted strawberries under cover to encourage earlier fruitingOrder seeds and make a sowing plan for greenhouse crops and bedding plantsCheck heaters are working efficiently and top up paraffin if necessaryPinch out the tips of autumn

before it’s flowered, but I can’t help leaving a few around the edge to provide food for wildlife.I hate seeing bare earth in my garden. If I expose the soil I sow a few seeds of red clover on the surface, which germinate quickly and provide some ground

premium.However, this year I decided to grow my onions from seed, and I've just been assessing the results. Yes, I did need to sow them in modular trays in the greenhouse in March, and could have started them even earlier if I'd had a heated propagator

container-grown roses and shrubsPrepare soil in flower beds for summer beddingTie in new growth on climbing plantsFlowersSow bean, marrow, courgette and squash seedsSpray peaches and nectarines with fungicide Pick rhubarb stems as they developFruit & veg

Grow dahlias from seedColourful dahlias make a welcome addition to the late-summer garden and will continue to flower until the first frost. While many dahlias are grown from tubers planted in May, you can also raise them from seed.Knock heavy snow

annuals into flower is to be mean and only feed the plants when changing the pot size; this way the plant won't produce too much foliage.For the Herb Farm we have been sowing French parsley. The trick to get a good germination is to sow the seeds

.So I've relented and planted a whole load of them. I sowed two seeds to a pot and put them in the cold frame to get them going quickly, safely away from the mice!

. (However, I did lose every single calabrese plant to the voracious little blighters, so I haven’t had it all my way.)Parsnips were a bit thin on the ground, due to a couple of disastrous sowings. It was breezy the first time I tried to sow the papery seeds

be sheltering slugs and snailsAround the gardenCollect seed from allium and sow straight awayPlant evergreen shrubs and conifer hedgesCarefully dig up gladioli corms FlowersKeep harvesting root veg such as beetroot and carrotsOrder fruit trees and bushes