Just the other day, I discovered a half-empty bottle of Lucozade left behind in the euphorbia trough by one of the scaffolders. A visiting architect joked, “Are you sure that’s Lucozade?” which made me see it differently.
In short, the garden is a bit of a mess. Sometimes neglect has its perks; coming back from a trip, I spotted a sunflower growing in the back corner.
Now, however, some necessary firefighting is underway. As I’m expecting a baby, I’ve enlisted a local gardener to remove invasive plants like green alkanet and young tree shoots from the neighbour’s tree, but keeping desirable plants. Then, in the newly cleared patches, I’ll be sowing green manure.
Green manure are superheroes when it comes to boosting soil quality.
My gardening friend Claire has written about green manure, as they play a key role in crop rotation for vegetable plots. But, the only things I’m picking from my garden right now are a few scrumped apples and some hardy herbs.
My ambitions for the garden are simple and steady – and improving the soil is top of the list. For those wondering, the scaffold is for roof repairs, and the garden boundaries are still wobbly, but the neighbours agree with replacing them.
Cover crops are like superheroes for your garden’s foundation. Soil likes to be covered, which is why weeds appear. Yet by sowing vigorous crops, you can control weeds, bring in bees, host pest-eating creatures, and fix nitrogen.
Green manure plants aren’t always showy – though some, like lupins ‘Blue Sonet’ and a flowering legume, have pretty flowers – but their purpose is to thrive rather than be admired. Once established, you can turn them under, cut them for compost, or leave them on the surface for earthworms to pull down. The real magic happens below the surface.
Now is the ideal time for sowing these cold-season plants. My selection includes rye grass, great for clay soil, Italian ryegrass, vetch, and beans that aerate soil.
There’s satisfaction in planting seeds that won’t stay forever – on the surface, anyway.
