Kitchen Garden - July

Vegetables

• Carry on sowing salad crops outside.  French beans can also be sown at the beginning of the month for a late crop.

• Onions will need a lot of water at this time of year or the yield will be greatly reduced.  Weeds will compete for every drop of water, so keep on hoeing around your onions to keep weeds at bay.
  

• Complete planting out young leeks.

Herbs

• Continue to harvest herbs for drying or freezing.
  

• The first week of the month is usually the best time to cut lavender for drying. Cut the hole stalk as soon as the flowers show colour, but before they are fully open.  Tie them in small bundles and hang in a greenhouse or warm shed or porch to dry. Alternatively you could lay them in trays in the airing cupboard.  When the flower buds are completely dry, rub them gently off the stalks. Use in muslin bags or small bowls.
  

Fruit

• Trained fruit trees, such as cordons, fans, dwarf pyramids and espaliers should be trimmed of any unwanted shoots this month.
  

• Pick blackcurrants as soon as they ripen. Growth being made now will produce next year’s crop so keep bushes watered in dry weather and give them a handful of J Arthur Bower's or New Horizon all-purpose plant food.

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