Summer Regional checklist
Our experts share their tips on how to keep your gardens in perfect condition all summer long from coast to coast
##West — Sharon Hanna##
**Add late bloomers**
Extend colour into fall with coneflowers (*Rudbeckia*), Sedum including ‘Autumn Joy’ and ‘Matrona’, sneezeweed (*Helenium*), asters and Russian sage (*Perovskia atriplicifolia*). Phlox will bloom at this time if you are ruthless enough to delay flowering by cutting it back fairly hard in April. **Get broccoli going**
Start purple-sprouting broccoli by mid-July, transplanting into the ground by early fall. Plants bide their time through winter, exploding into hundreds of tender purple florets in mid-spring. The more you harvest, the more buds you create. When buds break into bright yellow bloom, snap some off and toss into salads or use as a garnish. **Mix edibles and annuals**
Fill containers with edibles and contrasting annuals: pair parsley with bright blue-flowered *Anagallis*; pot marigolds with giant red mustard; and yellow-stemmed ‘Canary’ Swiss chard with purple ‘Supertunias’. Feed containers regularly to keep everyone happy. **And don’t forget to…**
Plant hardy leeks such as ‘Siegfried Frost’. Their roots improve soil tilth, they tolerate part shade and their flowers attract beneficial insects. *Sharon Hanna is a writer, seed specialist and director of a school horticulture program in Vancouver (Zone 7).*
##Prairies — Donna Balzer##
**Bind cauliflowers**
Use good stiff rubber bands to hold the leaves of cauliflower together as soon as tiny heads start to appear in August. This keeps the floret white like the grocery store ones instead of the natural yellowish, ricey look. **Stay cool**
Keep your plants cool with early-morning watering. Lawns kept long will shade themselves, increasing their tolerance to heat. **Hold off pruning**
Don’t prune or move plants when temperatures rise above 30°C because plant systems shut down when it’s really hot. **Deadhead diligently**
Remove flowers as soon as they fade to prevent excess re-seeding around the garden and to encourage re-blooming. Delphiniums, poppies, globe thistles, columbines, and salvias will flower again by fall if cut back early. Annuals trimmed just before a two-week vacation will be in bud again when you return! **Try dust mulching**
Invented on the prairies years ago, dust mulching still works. Simply scuffle the surface of the soil with a hoe to break the surface crust and allow better rain penetration. This is usually done around annuals or along rows of vegetables. **And don’t forget to…**
Seed a second crop of lettuce or peas in early summer so you don’t have only over-mature lettuce heads and dead dry peas come August. *Donna Balzer is a garden consultant, author, speaker and radio personality. She lives in Calgary (Zone 3).* ##Central — Mark Cullen## **Prevent tomato blight**
Spray tomato plants with Bordeaux mixture, a fungicide containing copper sulfate and hydrated lime. It’s the best preventive measure against early blight, which causes tomato plants to collapse later in summer, especially if we have a rainy August. Bordeaux mixture is safe for mammals but highly toxic to aquatic life, so don’t use it near ponds. **Stake tomatoes**
I prefer spiral stakes—there’s no tying and I get better tomatoes and more of them. Pinch out the suckers that grow between the leaf axils and main stem. **Conserve water**
Collecting water in rain barrels and using a soaker hose are two ways of conserving water. When using a soaker hose, cover the hose with two inches of bark mulch or an inch of soil for best results. **Prune spring-flowering shrubs**
Remove excessive growth on forsythia, lilac and other spring-flowering shrubs to boost the formation of new blossom buds for next year. **Feed your plants**
Unless you used a “feed and forget” fertilizer in spring, you should apply a quality fertilizer according to directions. If going organic, use compost tea in the first half of summer. **And don’t forget to…**
Remove spent blossoms from peonies, daylilies and other perennials before they mature into seed pods. *Mark Cullen is an author and radio host on CFRB in Toronto (Zone 6). He also appears weekly on CTV’s* Canada AM. ##Atlantic — Carla Allen## **Take herb cuttings**
Snip four-inch-long sections of fresh growth tips from thyme, lavender and sage in early summer. Dip the ends in rooting hormone and insert five or six cuttings into a pot filled with compost. Water, then place the pot in a plastic bag and move to a partly shady area. Cuttings will root within eight weeks. **Do second sowings**
Seek out shady seedbeds for second and third sowings of vegetables. Plant peas amid the corn to climb up stalks; carrots between the tomatoes; and lettuce and spinach between climbing beans. **Fine-tune water gardens**
Add plants like water hyacinth, water lilies or lotus—their leaves will shade the water and prevent algae growth. Fertilize blooming aquatic plants once a month to keep flowers coming. Put fish on a high protein diet—their metabolism increases as temperatures rise. **Keep roses blooming**
Cut flowers for bouquets and/or remove spent blooms by pruning just above the first five-leafed branchlet. Treat black spot by mixing one tablespoon of baking soda and 1/4 teaspoon of dishwashing detergent in one gallon of water and spritzing the foliage top and bottom. **And don’t forget to...**
Change your mowing pattern each time you cut the grass. This keeps the turf and soil from compacting and prevents wheel patterns in your lawn. *Carla Allen is an award-winning reporter/photographer and garden columnist. She lives in Yarmouth, NS (Zone 6).*
Extend colour into fall with coneflowers (*Rudbeckia*), Sedum including ‘Autumn Joy’ and ‘Matrona’, sneezeweed (*Helenium*), asters and Russian sage (*Perovskia atriplicifolia*). Phlox will bloom at this time if you are ruthless enough to delay flowering by cutting it back fairly hard in April. **Get broccoli going**
Start purple-sprouting broccoli by mid-July, transplanting into the ground by early fall. Plants bide their time through winter, exploding into hundreds of tender purple florets in mid-spring. The more you harvest, the more buds you create. When buds break into bright yellow bloom, snap some off and toss into salads or use as a garnish. **Mix edibles and annuals**
Fill containers with edibles and contrasting annuals: pair parsley with bright blue-flowered *Anagallis*; pot marigolds with giant red mustard; and yellow-stemmed ‘Canary’ Swiss chard with purple ‘Supertunias’. Feed containers regularly to keep everyone happy. **And don’t forget to…**
Plant hardy leeks such as ‘Siegfried Frost’. Their roots improve soil tilth, they tolerate part shade and their flowers attract beneficial insects. *Sharon Hanna is a writer, seed specialist and director of a school horticulture program in Vancouver (Zone 7).*
(continued below)
Use good stiff rubber bands to hold the leaves of cauliflower together as soon as tiny heads start to appear in August. This keeps the floret white like the grocery store ones instead of the natural yellowish, ricey look. **Stay cool**
Keep your plants cool with early-morning watering. Lawns kept long will shade themselves, increasing their tolerance to heat. **Hold off pruning**
Don’t prune or move plants when temperatures rise above 30°C because plant systems shut down when it’s really hot. **Deadhead diligently**
Remove flowers as soon as they fade to prevent excess re-seeding around the garden and to encourage re-blooming. Delphiniums, poppies, globe thistles, columbines, and salvias will flower again by fall if cut back early. Annuals trimmed just before a two-week vacation will be in bud again when you return! **Try dust mulching**
Invented on the prairies years ago, dust mulching still works. Simply scuffle the surface of the soil with a hoe to break the surface crust and allow better rain penetration. This is usually done around annuals or along rows of vegetables. **And don’t forget to…**
Seed a second crop of lettuce or peas in early summer so you don’t have only over-mature lettuce heads and dead dry peas come August. *Donna Balzer is a garden consultant, author, speaker and radio personality. She lives in Calgary (Zone 3).* ##Central — Mark Cullen## **Prevent tomato blight**
Spray tomato plants with Bordeaux mixture, a fungicide containing copper sulfate and hydrated lime. It’s the best preventive measure against early blight, which causes tomato plants to collapse later in summer, especially if we have a rainy August. Bordeaux mixture is safe for mammals but highly toxic to aquatic life, so don’t use it near ponds. **Stake tomatoes**
I prefer spiral stakes—there’s no tying and I get better tomatoes and more of them. Pinch out the suckers that grow between the leaf axils and main stem. **Conserve water**
Collecting water in rain barrels and using a soaker hose are two ways of conserving water. When using a soaker hose, cover the hose with two inches of bark mulch or an inch of soil for best results. **Prune spring-flowering shrubs**
Remove excessive growth on forsythia, lilac and other spring-flowering shrubs to boost the formation of new blossom buds for next year. **Feed your plants**
Unless you used a “feed and forget” fertilizer in spring, you should apply a quality fertilizer according to directions. If going organic, use compost tea in the first half of summer. **And don’t forget to…**
Remove spent blossoms from peonies, daylilies and other perennials before they mature into seed pods. *Mark Cullen is an author and radio host on CFRB in Toronto (Zone 6). He also appears weekly on CTV’s* Canada AM. ##Atlantic — Carla Allen## **Take herb cuttings**
Snip four-inch-long sections of fresh growth tips from thyme, lavender and sage in early summer. Dip the ends in rooting hormone and insert five or six cuttings into a pot filled with compost. Water, then place the pot in a plastic bag and move to a partly shady area. Cuttings will root within eight weeks. **Do second sowings**
Seek out shady seedbeds for second and third sowings of vegetables. Plant peas amid the corn to climb up stalks; carrots between the tomatoes; and lettuce and spinach between climbing beans. **Fine-tune water gardens**
Add plants like water hyacinth, water lilies or lotus—their leaves will shade the water and prevent algae growth. Fertilize blooming aquatic plants once a month to keep flowers coming. Put fish on a high protein diet—their metabolism increases as temperatures rise. **Keep roses blooming**
Cut flowers for bouquets and/or remove spent blooms by pruning just above the first five-leafed branchlet. Treat black spot by mixing one tablespoon of baking soda and 1/4 teaspoon of dishwashing detergent in one gallon of water and spritzing the foliage top and bottom. **And don’t forget to...**
Change your mowing pattern each time you cut the grass. This keeps the turf and soil from compacting and prevents wheel patterns in your lawn. *Carla Allen is an award-winning reporter/photographer and garden columnist. She lives in Yarmouth, NS (Zone 6).*
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