I just received my monthly newsletter from the GardenShop, and in it they had a section called “July Gardening Guide”.

I thought I’d post those tips here, and encourage you to go pay their site a visit.

Of course, these tips relate to South Africa, so they may not be relevant to everybody.

July Gardening Guide courtesy of GardenShop

• Plant Lilium bulbs
• Feed your winter-flowering annuals with Multifeed Flowergro or Margaret Roberts Supercharger
• Water and fertilise plants, herbs and annuals in outdoor containers regularly
• Continue watering spring flowering shrubs regularly, at least once a week as they are starting to form buds for flowering in early spring
• In the Highveld continue to water Kikuyu lawn at least twice a month
• Water Citrus trees
• Prune roses from mid to end July, this will exclude Rambling and Old English roses that are forming buds now to flower in early spring
• Prune Hydrangeas from mid to end July
• Prune deciduous fruit trees
• July is the perfect time to carry out any maintenance work on your trees
• Protect your frost sensitive plants
• Repot indoor and outdoor container plants
• Improve soil structure by digging in generous amounts of compost and well rotted manure
• Continue mulching soil with compost, sawdust, bark chips and fallen leaves – this will prevent solid moisture loss and keep the roots warm through the winter
• Continue spreading insecticide granules around the base of your conifers
• Plant vegetable seedlings like cabbage, leeks, onions, moss-curled parsley, Swiss chard and spinach
• Plant flower seedlings like alyssum, cineraria, chrysanthemum, delphinium, primulas, primula obconica, phlox, petunia and viola

I hope you found these gardening tips useful and go subscribe to the GardenShop newsletter.

© James for Make a good house a GREAT home, 2009. | Gardening Tips for July | 4 comments. Click here to add yours... |

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There are 2 things that I have found may cause this:

The weed MUST be growing

One thing I’ve noticed is that a weed has to be growing actively for weed killer to be effective.

This means you have to water your weeds for a bit to ensure they’re growing. If it’s dormant or in a slow-growing phase, it won’t absorb the poison quickly enough for it to take effect.

That sounds like a pain, but I guess you’re probably already watering the area around the weed anyway. You may have to increase the watering for a while before you actually spray the weed with the weed killer.

Don’t water the weed for a few of days afterwards

This is an obvious one, I guess, but I would say to be on the safe side, ensure that your weeds are dry for at least 3 days after your sprayed them.

This gives the poison a chance to work it’s way into the weeds root system before being washed off.

So, do YOU have any other tips for getting rid of weeds?

© James for Make a good house a GREAT home, 2008. | Did your weed killer not work properly? | No comments yet. Click here to add yours... |

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But, I have quite a few that live in the garden, and about 4 or 5 that live right in my herb garden.

Since they “moved in” (well, started their little family, because I’ve seen a few grow from tiny little things to quite large lizards), the number of unwanted bugs in my herb garden has DRAMATICALLY decreased.

At one point there were quite a few large ants that seemed to be taking over, especially over my basil tree, but now there are no ants to be seen. I’m not sure if lizards eat ants, or just keep them out, but I’m happy.

Anyway, I just thought I would share a few photos I’ve taken of the lizards in my herb garden. Just click on an image to see a larger version.

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I hope it’s not just my garden that’s affected, but it’s a REAL pain. Especially if you don’t have a gardener to do all the de-weeding for you.

So I went to the shops to try and find a weed killer that I can use in my lawn, that doesn’t kill the grass as well.

I found Efekto “No Weed Lawn” at the Hyperama, and it works like a charm!

It does make the grass go brown for a while, but it doesn’t kill it, and the grass will grow green again after a few days.

Here’s what it says on the back of the bottle:

Warnings

- Handle with care
- Poisonous when absorbed through the skin or swallowed or inhaled. Toxic to bees, fish and wildlife.
- Store in a cool place
- Store away from food, feed, seed, other agricultural chemicals and out of reach of children

Precautions

- Do not inhale spray mist
- Wash contaminated clothing daily
- Wash with sooap and water immediately after accidental skin contact
- Do not eat, drink or smoke whilst applying or before washing hand and face and change of clothing
- Avoid spraydrift onto susceptible broad-leaved plants such as grazing, rivers, dams and other areas not under treatment
- Do not spray where roots of desirable plants can absorb the chemical or in locations where the chemical may be washed or moved into contact with their roots
- The chemical is carried downwards into the soil by water and should not be used therefore, near shrubs, trees or flowering plants
- To avoid injury to desirable plants, spray equipment used for application should not be re-used to apply other materials to such
- Dispose of wash water where it will not contaminate crops, grazing, rivers and dams
- Destroy empty container and never use for any other purpose
- Prevent contamination of food, feed, drinking water and eating utensils

Directions for use

Apply after emergence of broadleaf weeds
Can be used on established lawns and turf consisting of the following grass cultivars: Bradley, Elliot, Germiston, Hall’s Selection, Harrismith, Magennis, Outeniqua, Reitz, Cape Royal, Schaapplaas, Tifton en Zwartkop blou, Kikoejoe, St. Augustine, Swazi en Zoysia

Note:

EFEKTO NO WEED LAWN ready-to-use may cause a discolouration of the grass. This will however, be of a temporary nature. Active growing Kikuyu-grass will be affected more severely and may require a longer period to recover.

The application of a nitrogenous fertilizer 2-3 weeks prior to treating with the herbicide is recommended

Application

EFEKTO NO WEED LAWN ready-to-use is applied as a fine spray. Wet total leaf surface of broadleaf weeds well. Repeat after 2 to 4 weeks if necessary.

I always spray the weed killer while wearing gloves, and after reading the above, I’m pretty glad I do.

I’m not sure if this specific weed-killer is only available in South Africa, so if you use something else that you would like to recommend, it might really help the other readers, so please leave a comment below.

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I spoke to somebody else and they mentioned that cats don’t like using wet soil as their litter box, so I’m trying to keep the soil as moist as possible by watering often. It kills 2 birds with one stone by ensuring that my flowers are well watered, and the vain little cats don’t get their paws wet.

Does it work?

I think so. If for some reason I don’t manage to water as often as I’d like, then I’ll notice that a cat has paid me a visit.

Ideas

I’ve noticed that a few websites on the internet suggest using a sprinkler system set up with a motion sensor. It’s quite an interesting idea, though perhaps a little overboard. If you have automatic sprinklers, than you shouldn’t have a problem.

I’ve also seen it said that you can pour vinegar around the area. This would be safer for my herbs, but I haven’t tried it (as I haven’t really needed to).

If you have any ideas, I’d love to hear them. Please leave a comment below…

© James for Make a good house a GREAT home, 2007. | Prevent cats pooping in my garden | 12 comments. Click here to add yours... |

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Cut out and remove grass

I followed the same steps I used when creating the herb garden. Go check out what I did by reading the following articles:

Herb Garden – Step 1 – Mark out your area
Herb Garden – Step 2 – Remove the grass

Create proper edges

Using the spade, I created really defined (and about 15cm deep) edges for the rose garden. I wanted a properly defined area, where the grass and the soil would not meet. I also decided not to use straight lines for the edges, hoping that the curves would add to the beauty that this garden will soon be.

Lay edging panels

Every time we go to the nursery, we get plastic “sheeting” to lay down in the car to prevent it from getting dirty. I used this to line the edges that I had cut out to prevent the grass from spreading into the rose garden’s soil. I know I will still be taking out weeds and grass, but this will hopefully minimise that.

I bought little wooden poles (about 25cm long) that I am using to create a decorative edging for the garden. So, making sure I had plastic in between these poles and the edge (where the grass stops), I placed the poles in the soil, trying to make sure that they were lined up.

Here is what it looked like just before finishing this process:

(You’ll have to excuse the bad quality of this and other photos, due to the fact that my digital camera is not working, and I’ve had to use the shocking camera on my iMate KJam)

© James for Make a good house a GREAT home, 2006. | Rose Garden – Plot out and prepare the area | 2 comments. Click here to add yours... |

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As I write the articles, I’ll add a link to the bottom of this article as an index/reference point for all my Rose Garden articles… Perhaps bookmark this page so you can come back to it, and maybe see how my garden is going, as I plan on posting updates and lessons learned as I go along. Of course, if you have any of your own experiences, thoughts or ideas to share, please leave a comment.

Anyway, wish me luck.

Rose Garden Article Index:

Rose Garden – Plot out and prepare the area
Rose Garden – Water, water, water
Rose Garden – Dig your hole and plant a rose
4 tips for caring for Roses

© James for Make a good house a GREAT home, 2006. | Creating a Rose Garden | Only one comment. Click here to add yours... |

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Riding Lawn Mowers

Pros:

- Easily cuts large lawns
- Can be really easy to control
- Fun to use

Cons:

- Can be overkill
- Can be difficult to get between your fancy trees or hedges

Push Lawn Mowers

Pros:

- Can be easier to access tight areas
- Less expensive
- Quicker to setup for small gardens

Cons:

- Can be hard work
- Can take a LONG time to cut a lot of grass
- Uphills?!?

But, there’s also something else you need to consider when you buy a lawn mower, regardless of whether it’s an electric lawn mower or a petrol lawn mower: the type of blade to use. You could get a lawn mower with a rotary blade, or cylindrical blades. Lawn mowers with a cylinder cutter tend to cut the grass a LOT better, by just trimming the top off the grass. Because of this, you can get a closer cut without destroying your lawn. Unfortunately, the cylindrical cutters tend to be a tad more expensive, so look around…

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1 – Broken Egg shells or Sea shells:

Snails REALLY don’t enjoy the feeling of crawling/sliming their way over this, so you can scatter these around plants that you want to protect.

2 – Beer traps:

Place jars of beer in the ground, with the top of the open jar level with the ground. The snails will crawl into the jar, and drown. Whether they’re just looking for a good time or not I’m not sure, but don’t waste your imported beer on the slimey pests.

3 – Salt – WARNING: Huge cruelty effect to plants AND snails:

Salt is a serious snail killer, making them sizzle. It’s a bit cruel, in my mind, but then, so are most of these methods. Pouring salt around infected areas will help get rid of snails, but it will also kill plants, so try not to pour it near your plants.

4 – Sandpaper:

Something easily bought online, placing your pot plants on sandpaper will help keep them safe. The snails won’t crawl over the sandpaper to get to your pots, leaving the plants snail free.

5 – Organic Pesticide:

I’ve heard that there are a few websites selling organic pesticide that is useful in getting rid of snails. I think this might be the best route to take, as Organic Pesticide is safe for your plants as well. Remember to read up about the organic pesticide first, especially if you have pets or children who love the garden.

If you have any tips yourself, please feel free to leave them in a comment…

© James for Make a good house a GREAT home, 2006. | Get rid of Snails | 15 comments. Click here to add yours... |

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Some reasons for growing a herb garden are:

• For decoration – Herbs can also have some flowers that can add to the look of your garden
• For medicinal herbs – Natural medicine is something that is becoming quite popular at the moment, and there are herbs for every type of ailment, like weight loss, colds, fevers, depression, etc…
• Herbs for cooking - Herbs are obviously a great addition to cooking, adding extra flavour, sometimes subtle, sometimes not.

So, what I’m going to be doing is documenting the process of creating a basic herb garden. I will mainly be planting herbs for food, as, being married to an Italian, my wife definitely know how to cook with herbs.

Before we begin, let me show you what to expect:

BEFORE:

AFTER:

Unfortunately, the 24 hours is man hours, not “1 Day”. So, if you’re doing this by yourself (and, this also depends on the size of your herb garden), the 24 hours can be spread over a few days. But here’s a bit of a preview after 22 hours. You can see that I still need to do some straightening out and some filling up:

:::::::::

In the coming days I will be posting more information on the herbs I’ve used, but if you’re still not sure what herbs you personally would like to use, browse around. There are a ton of websites with information on herb use, and on some of them you can even buy seeds or cuttings to help start you off.

:::::::::

Here are the articles that will help and guide you when creating your herb garden:

Herb Garden – Step 1 – Mark out your area
Herb Garden – Step 2 – Remove the grass
Herb Garden – Step 3 – Laying the stepping stones
Herb Garden – Step 4 – Plant the herbs
Herb Garden – Step 5 – Look after it
Herb Garden – Before and After

© James for Make a good house a GREAT home, 2006. | Herb Garden in 24 hours | 3 comments. Click here to add yours... |

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