22 September 2026

September in the Garden: Celebrate and renew.

Summer isn’t quite ready to let go yet but we have certainly had some much-needed rainfall and the nights are starting to slowly draw in. For some people, September heralds their favourite season, autumn, whereas for others the loss of the summer heat will be sorely missed. September though can be a month of opportunity, seeds still to sow, crops to harvest, bulbs to plant and most importantly, soil to rescue. I love nothing better then grabbing a cuppa and noting down everything that needs doing before it gets properly chilly!

On the allotment

I had a bit of a disaster as badgers came in and devastated everyone’s sweetcorn crop, including mine, and with that went the beans that were growing up the corn. Badgers don’t seem to like pumpkins though and my giant pumpkin is now ready to be harvested. I used the no-dig method on this patch, using Durstons Peat Free Soil Conditioner and Manure and I have to say, the soil is still working hard and has really retained moisture during the hot dry summer. I’m sure the badgers enjoyed the corn. The fruit trees have been incredibly stressed and have shed most of their crop early so the key this autumn will be to weed around the area and then give them a really good mulch after some heavy rainfall.

In The Garden

Most of my flowering plants are grown in containers and I am thrilled that so many of them are still thriving. In particular, a pot I planted up in May with a mixture of a Dahlia, Cosmos, bunny tail grasses, and Verbena Rigida using Durston’s Award Winning, Peat Free Tub and Basket Compost, is still flowering its socks off. I used my shower water religiously and none of them seem to have suffered. I have kept feeding and deadheading so am sure they will last for a good few more weeks.

September Essentials: Soil health, lay the foundations for a great garden now.

After the summers drought, now is the perfect time to take stock of what has done well and what has really struggled. On social media everywhere, you will see people talking about planting drought tolerant and Mediterranean plants. While that will work for a dry summer, just be a little cautious, as with the hot, dry summers often comes very wet winters and those types of plants really hate getting their feet wet. By all means, plant some drought tolerant plants but make sure you have good drainage or plant them in pots with very gritty compost.

Soil Health

What will help your garden next year, rather than throwing all your parched plants on the compost, is looking after the soil. Plants in beds and borders that grow year on year with nothing done to the soil except the occasional granular feed will find it harder and harder to retain moisture and nutrients. This is where mulching comes into its own. Mulching protects roots from extremes of temperature and keeps the moisture where it belongs, in the soil. The best part is, you don’t need to dig it in, the worms and other organisms will do all that for you. Durstons Peat Free Soil conditioner, manure and even bark are great natural choices for mulching. The key is to add it after significant rainfall, lay it thickly around your plants but never mulch up to the woody stems, leave a small ring around plants.

Lawns
Very slowly, lawns will start to recover but to give them a boost, add some Durstons Top soil over the lawn and then scatter lawn seed on to this, raking it in gently. Autumn is the perfect time to give your lawn some tlc, and doing this will gently, but surely ensure the new seed will take root, and your lawn will bounce back in the spring. Keep raking leaves off the lawn as you go, rather than wait for them all to come down as they will quickly turn the lawn yellow.

Harvesting Now:

Courgettes
keep harvesting before they turn to marrows and start to cut off any leaves that shown signs of powdery mildew, –

Tomatoes
will be coming to the end of their ripening times on the vine so it’s best to harvest the green ones, pop them in a cardboard box with an apple or banana and leave them somewhere cool and dark.

Runner Beans
Some people are clever and manage to keep up with the picking before they turn stringy. If, like me, you haven’t then the best thing to do is leave the large ones on the stems and let them dry, so you then have free seeds to sow next year.

Pumpkins and Squash
These will be starting to ripen now, so remove any dying foliage or leaves that are covering the fruit to allow any last autumn sunshine. You know they will be ready to harvest when you can only just push your thumb nail into the skin.

Autumn garden glow up

Many plants in pots have gone over more quickly than usual so replant now for a burst of colour when everything else is fading. My top choices for an autumn glow up include:

Purple Asters
Bright yellow Rudbeckias
Golden grasses such as Pennisetum’s
Burnished orange Chrysanthemums
Winter flowering heathers
Cyclamen

These can be planted up in containers using a good peat free compost such as Durstons award winning Tub and Basket compost or pop them into gaps in your beds and borders.

Not only will you be adding colour for you, but also food for the pollinators.

Bulbs, bulbs, and more bulbs

Every garden centre and catalogue will be full of an amazing array of bulbs. Bulbs are a wonderful way of adding colour and joy to your garden but don’t be too hasty to plant them out. The soil is still very dry and hard and the expected autumn rains haven’t properly arrived. Daffodils do need planting earlier and if you can get them in the ground, go ahead and plant them otherwise I’d start filling up empty containers, using Durstons bulb fibre. You can layer them, but I prefer to cram lots of the same type but different varieties into the same container.

Definitely leave planting tulips till later on, November or December , but buy now to get the varieties you want and store somewhere cool and dry.

Plants for free!

With our purses being pinched these days, there’s nothing better than being able to collect your own seeds. Not only is this free, but if you make some pretty handmade seed packets using wrapping paper or even pictures from garden magazines you can give them as gifts.

The main rules to seed sowing are to make sure the seeds are really dry, that you store them somewhere cool and dry and that you label what is in the packet and when you collected them.

My favourite seeds to collect include:

Nigella
Poppy
Chives
Zinnias
Orlaya

You can sow some of these direct in your garden where they are to flower now or wait till spring and sow in some seed compost ready to plant out.

Take Stock

September is the perfect time to pause and reflect. If you’ve found some plants that have struggled so much that you fell out of love them then maybe now is the time for thinking about replacements, choosing hardier plants that wont need so much cosseting and watering.

Take photos of areas of the garden and start a garden journal, writing down winners and losers. We all think we will remember but trust me, we don’t! Label any perennials and deciduous shrubs before you forget what they are and dig them up or compost them by mistake! Whatever went wrong this summer, learn from it and remember, there is always next year.