Question: What can we put in our coldframe at this time of year (August) it seems a shame not to use it. Brooke, Williamsport, Pennsylvania
Answer: Brooke, if garden space is scarce, vegetable seeds can be sown in the coldframe and transplanted later. In the colder sections, lettuce, endive and Chinese cabbage can be brought to maturity within the frame.
Spring-flowering biennials – pansies, English daisies, forget-me-nots and Siberian wallflowers – are best started in the coldframe. Use considerable peat-moss or leafmold in the soil mixture, and because the seeds germinate better if kept cool, shade the glass heavily and provide a slight opening for ventilation.
You can still root cuttings of the shrubs suggested in last month’s Pointers. You can also take root cuttings of oriental poppy varieties now. Pieces 3 inches long, the thickness of a pencil or much thicker, root readily in sandy soil. Make sure that the right end is up when the pieces are inserted in the medium, and merely cover them, don’t bury them too deep in the soil.
Time For Layering
This month (August) is a good time to propagate trees and shrubs by the simple art of layering. Layering, as most gardeners know, is the rooting of branches of woody plants while they are still attached to the parent plant. It’s probably the most economical way of increasing stock. Layering is practiced heavily in the foliage trade in southern Florida and Central America. The reason for the sure success of this method is that during the rooting process, the new plant is attached to the mother plant.
Practically any shrub, including roses, can be propagated thus – also most evergreens. Indeed, layering is practiced extensively on evergreens, especially rhododendrons, although a longer period is required to root evergreens than most flowering shrubs. The latter will usually root sufficiently by the spring following layering to be transplanted at that time. Evergreens may require 18 months to two years to develop adequate roots.
Best Results In Layering
To achieve best results in layering, careful soil preparation is needed. The ground around the mother plant should be loosened up, the soil made fine, some peatmoss and sand added, and the mixture moderately firmed. No fertilizer should be used.
Watering and Fertilizing
August heat is giving plants a difficult time as always. With the moisture reserve in the soil generally low, artificial watering (irrigation) is necessary. For vegetables and flowers, fertilizing is also necessary. And when both are needed, the two should always be applied together, for fertilizer without plenty of water is not only useless but can do harm.
Watering plants properly is an art. It certainly is not a matter of pouring water on the soil. Applied under pressure, water injures the soil structure. When churned by a stream of water, the clay particles at first separate from the mass, then become liquid. When watering stops, these ultra-fine particles settle into the mass but only to form an impervious layer – almost like liquid cement – which shuts out the air from the soil around the roots.
Before watering, first open the soil by cultivation. When hand watering use a water breaker on the hose nozzle so that the water will “rain” out and sink into the soil gently. Or you can apply water gradually with a fine-mist sprinkler. After a day or two (the exact interval depending upon the consistency of the soil), loosen the soil surface an inch or so deep. This dust mulch, as it is called, conserves moisture. Other coverings – such as hay, leaves, grass or weeds – will perform the same service.
The Food Garden
Now is the time to sow or plant lettuce, endive, Chinese cabbage, curled or upland cress, radishes, turnips and kohlrabi for late fall harvesting. This imposing list for the late month of August may surprise all but seasoned gardeners. But even other vegetables can be started now. As far north as southern Connecticut, snap beans are still a possibility, and plants of an early cabbage variety will mature by late fall if put in now. But it’s too late to start cabbage from seed.
