Yahoo Lifestyle Quick tips to maintain your autumn veggie patch
Photo: Thinkstock
Maintenance
Vegetables:
It's time to clear beds - pull out any leftover summer vegie plants and revitalise the soil with compost and manure. Replant with cool-season vegetables, such as broad beans, broccoli, spinach, onions and shallots.
Sow areas not required until spring with a green manure crop such as field lupins, field peas or cereal. Broadcast seeds on soil enriched with 35g superphosphate per square metre.
Prepare ground for broad beans, preferably in a bed which has had a previous root crop, in reasonably heavy, welldrained soil. Broad beans hate acid so broadcast half a cup of lime to the square metre. Two or three weeks later dig in a liberal quantity of compost and rotted manure.
Leave pumpkins on vines until foliage withers. Cut with 7 cm of stalk attached to prevent entry of diseases. Dry off in sun.
Protect cauliflower stems from wind by hilling up soil around plants. Side-dress fortnightly with 45g of sulphate of ammonia per square metre. Water generously in dry or hot weather and hoe weeds regularly. Secure leaves over developing `curds' to protect against sun and frost which spoil pristine whiteness.
In cold zones
The vegetable garden is finishing now. Dig in green leaf material and add lime or dolomite to surface. Add excess vegetable waste to compost heap. Harvest main potato crop and store tubers in a dry dark spot. Store pumpkins between layers of straw and place on well-ventilated shelves in a warm spot. Remove any unsound fruit from time to time and check for slaters, slugs and rodents.
Fruit:
In tropical zones
Fertilise mangoes, particularly trees which are producing; with a fertiliser mixture high in potash, 250 g for every year of growth. Fertiliser distribution should be over an area equal to the tree canopy.
Citrus trees need a light pruning to remove dead material and watershoots. After the leaching effect of the wet season, an application of half the annual fertiliser rates is advised: about 2.5 kg of a 10N/14P/10K or similar mixture for a mature tree.
In cold zones
Young lemon trees need protection for several years. Move potted trees into a sheltered position.
READ: How to start a permaculture garden
Get planting before April:
Artichoke, capsicum, cucumber, eggplant, pumpkin, sweet potato.
In cold zones
Carrots, cabbages, Chinese greens, leeks, parsnips, rocket, silverbeet.
