WITH the dry spell of weather and warm sunshine, some rose bushes will start to drop their leaves.

Check the base of your bushes and remove any fallen leaves. This will help reduce the risk of fungal spores surviving in the soil. Also, remove any leaves showing signs of blackspot. With this disease the leaves start to turn yellow and black spots appear on them. If your roses are repeat flowering type, after the first flush of flowers have faded give the bushes a top dressing of rose fertiliser. Rake it into the topsoil and give a good watering.

As I have written in previous issues of my column, at the height of summer it is nice to sit back and enjoy the garden now that all the hard work is done, but if you want to keep your plants flowering all summer don’t forget to feed them – especially plants growing in containers. I water and feed mine once a week and also dead head any flowers that are past their best. Hopefully this will keep them flowering until the frost hits them.

Now is a good time to take cuttings of geraniums. Take the cuttings from the top of the plant that has no flowers on it. It should be about three inches long and cut just below a leaf joint. Insert them into a four inch pot lightly filled with compost water and place in a propogater or a well lit window sill. Leave till you see new growth appearing then pot into individual pots.

In the greenhouse I have started to pick my first tomatoes. What a difference in the taste than the tomatoes bought in the shops! During the warm sunny days I water the tomato plants twice a day, once in early morning and once again in the evening. I like to keep the compost moist to prevent blossom end rot on the tomatoes. This shows as a brown patch on the bottom of the fruit – a shortage of calcium can also cause this. On the hottest days the temperature can reach one hundred degrees in the greenhouse so I flood the floor to cool the house down. The windows and the doors are kept open right through to late evening. In the vegetable garden I have finished picking my first sowing of peas and also my early potatoes. I will close for now and hope you are enjoying the fruits of your labour.