August, north of the equator

August looks like high summer and behaves like the start of autumn. The days are already shortening noticeably by the end of it, the harvest is at its heaviest, and the sowings made now are the ones that decide whether there is anything to eat in November. It is a month with two jobs that have nothing to do with each other.

In the garden

Sow the winter salads: spinach, rocket, oriental leaves, lamb’s lettuce, radish, spring onions and an overwintering lettuce. Wait for the second half of the month if the weather is still hot, because lettuce seed refuses to germinate in warm soil. Sow hardy annuals such as calendula towards the end of the month for an early display next year, and they will flower a fortnight before anything sown in spring.

Harvest and preserve. Beans, courgettes, tomatoes, cucumbers, early apples and the last of the raspberries all arrive together. Keep picking whether or not you need it, because a plant that sets seed stops working. Take softwood and semi ripe cuttings of shrubs, and collect seed as the pods turn papery.

Water the newly planted and the containers, and leave the rest. Prune the summer fruiting raspberries once they finish, cutting out the canes that carried the crop and tying in the new ones. Order spring bulbs now, because the good ones sell out by the end of September.

In the house

The watering interval starts to lengthen from about the middle of the month. It is a gentle change rather than a switch, and it follows the light rather than the thermometer, which is why a warm September can still mean less water than a dull August.

Bring in the plants that summered outside before the nights turn, and check every one for passengers first. Slugs under the rim, vine weevil in the compost and aphids on the new growth all travel indoors happily. A thorough look and a rinse saves a winter of trouble.

Stop feeding anything that will be resting over winter, and reduce the rest to monthly. Give the cacti and succulents a last proper soak this month, because from September they want a good deal less and a wet succulent in a dark room is a rotted one by Christmas.

What not to do yet

Do not repot, and do not plant bulbs yet except the autumn flowering ones. Do not cut back the perennials for tidiness, because the seed heads feed birds and shelter insects through the winter and look better under frost than a bare bed does.