Late summer is a wonderful time in the garden: the weather is stable, there is still warmth still in the soil, plus there’s a hint of the cooler weather to come. It’s the perfect time for lots of garden jobs. Subscribe 🔔 http://ab.co/GA-subscribe

Take time to observe and plan.
For example, Millie is growing dahlias and in her cool-climate she lifts and stores the tubers each winter to avoid them rotting in the wet soil. But by spring it’s hard to remember which tuber has which colour flower, so now is a great time to tag the plants.

Save seed.
Plants acclimatise to suit their local environment, so by saving seed from your healthiest, favourite vegies and plants, you are sure of growing plants that will do well in your garden.

Millie collects seed of lettuce, carrot and cornflower.

Plant seedlings.
It’s hard to establish new plants in cold soil, so Millie starts planting autumn and winter crops in late summer, while the soil is still warm.

In place of the recently harvested carrot, she forks over the soil, layers on some fresh compost, forks this in again and soaks it really well.

If planting brassica seedlings, check the leaves for caterpillar eggs before planting. Mulch thinly, to avoid swamping the small plants; you can top the mulch more thickly as the plants grow. Water in well, then net to protect from cabbage white butterflies and other pests.

Plant seeds.
Raising new plants from seed is also good now, so that you have seedlings ready to be planted out as soon as space is available.

Millie even plants more unusual crops such as turnip and beetroot that generally are better sown directly into the soil. She plants them in cells that are easily transplanted to avoid disturbing the roots too much.

Make compost.
This is the most important job of all! Millie uses two methods: a cold compost that breaks down slowly as she continually adds kitchen scraps, and a larger bay that will take a full cubic metre of compostable materials in one hit, which becomes a hot compost.

There are a couple of rules to all methods:

* You need diversity – leafy greens as well and dry, brown materials such as straw, leaves or shredded paper.

* Chop up your material as small as possible to make it easily available for the bacteria and other organisms that break it down.

To make chopping easier, Millie has invested in an electric mulcher. She adds compost and leaves to the finely chopped waste, mixes it all up and adds the magic ingredient: water. Keep the pile moist, cover it if possible, and turn and water again in a few days to speed up the composting process.

Featured plants:
Dahlia (Dahlia cv.)
Lettuce ‘Red Cos’ (Lactuca sativa cv.)
Cornflower (Centaurea cyanus cv.)
Carrot ‘Chantenay Red Cored’ (Daucus carota cv.)

Filmed on Taungurung Country in Central Victoria
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