The Gardener's Journal is a free monthly gardening guide delivered direct to your inbox.

Each month, receive tips on the top jobs needed in your garden as well as a wealth of information on a range of gardening topics. From sowing seeds to picking fruit, each month get access to information on the care and maintenance of your flowerbeds, vegetable plot and lawn. As with your own gardening diary, the journal is split into separate sections, each covering a different area of garden care.

Monday 2 November 2015

This Month in your Garden - November

Carry on gardening


Why not make the first satisfying job this month one of planting tulips in what will be the sunniest spot. They like heavy soil lightened with some coarse grit and will reward you next spring with their variety and colour, especially when planted in a scheme with wallflowers and pansies.

Lilies can also be planted out now. Laying them on their sides on some sharp sand in the planting hole will aid drainage.

Lawn Care Guide - November

Still growing strong


Generally, you should be nearing the last mow of the season and time to put away the garden tractor or mower as far as the lawn is concerned. There may be some last jobs to do with accessories such as slitter attached to the lawn tractor and then you might want to get your machinery serviced – you may want to use it as a snow plough in the winter! Grass continues to grow in temperatures above 5º (41ºF) which may mean some final cuts with the cutting height set to about 4cm (1.5”).

Lawn Care: Questions & Answers

Q. We have to walk across the lawn to the greenhouse and shed. In winter it becomes a muddy path and the grass disappears. Any suggestions?

The Vegetable Plot - November

Calls for a spade – until you need a fork


A matured compost heap offers a big reward this month as you dig the goodness into the vegetable plot. A compost tumbler is another, fast, way to make compost to add to the cleared vegetable beds.

It’s the end of the season for half-hardy vegetables so enjoy your runner beans, courgettes, marrows and sweet corn. What’s left and you don’t want goes on the compost.

The Big Glut Recipe - November

A pearl of a pheasant dish for Sunday


Ring the changes for a Sunday lunch or dinner with plump pheasant (which the butcher has prepared unless you’re a pheasant plucker) with pearl barley and garden veg. Serves 4

Ingredients

  • 600ml (21 fl oz) of chicken stock
  • 100g (3.5oz) pearl barley
  • 1 tsp salt
  • 50g (1.8oz) goose fat or butter
  • 2 oven-ready pheasants
  • 4 rashers unsmoked rindless back bacon
  • 8 shallots, peeled