Just the other day, I discovered a half-empty bottle of Lucozade placed in the euphorbia trough by one of the scaffolders. A visiting architect commented, “Are you sure that’s Lucozade?” giving me a new perspective.
In short, the garden is in disarray. But there’s a lot to be said for negligence; coming back from a trip, I spotted a sunflower growing in the back corner.
This week, though, some necessary firefighting is underway. Being six months pregnant, I’ve enlisted a professional gardener to tackle troublesome weeds like green alkanet and young tree shoots from the neighbour’s tree, while leaving the good stuff. Next, in the open patches, I’ll be sowing cover crops.
Cover crops act like heroes when it comes to improving soil health.
A fellow garden writer has written about green manure, as they are essential in seasonal planting for edible gardens. But, the only things I’m picking from my garden right now are a few foraged apples and some woody herbs.
My ambitions for the garden are simple and steady – and improving the soil is top of the list. To update concerned readers, the scaffolding is for roof repairs, and the garden boundaries are still wobbly, but the neighbours agree with the plan.
Green manure are like superheroes for your garden’s foundation. Soil likes to be covered, which is why unwanted plants pop up. Yet by sowing fast-growing plants, you can suppress weeds, attract pollinators, host pest-eating creatures, and fix nitrogen.
Cover crops may not look exciting – though some, like lupins ‘Blue Sonet’ and a flowering legume, have pretty flowers – but their purpose is to grow vigorously rather than look decorative. 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 forage rye, which breaks up heavy earth, a nitrogen-lifter, a weed-suppressor, and beans that aerate soil.
It feels rewarding in sowing something that won’t stay forever – on the surface, anyway.
