Just the other day, I discovered a partially finished bottle of Lucozade placed in the euphorbia trough by one of the scaffolders. An architect friend joked, “Are you sure that’s Lucozade?” giving me a new perspective.
In short, the garden is a bit of a mess. 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 hired a professional gardener to remove troublesome weeds like a prickly weed and young tree shoots from the neighbour’s tree, while leaving the good stuff. Then, in the newly cleared patches, I’ll be sowing green manure.
Green manure are superheroes when it comes to boosting soil quality.
A fellow garden writer has written about green manure, as they are essential in seasonal planting for edible gardens. However, the only things I’m picking from my garden right now are a few scrumped apples and some hardy herbs.
My ambitions for the garden are simple and steady – and enhancing soil health is my main priority. For those wondering, the scaffolding is for roof repairs, and the garden boundaries are still wobbly, but the neighbours are on board with the plan.
Green manure are like superheroes for your garden’s foundation. Bare soil invites weeds, which is why weeds appear. But by sowing fast-growing plants, you can suppress weeds, attract pollinators, host pest-eating creatures, and fix nitrogen.
Green manure plants may not look exciting – though some, like lupins ‘Blue Sonet’ and bird’s foot trefoil, have lovely blooms – but their role is to thrive rather than look decorative. Once established, you can dig them into the soil, chop them for mulch, or leave them on the surface for worms to pull down. Their work happens underground.
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 field beans.
It feels rewarding in planting seeds knowing it’s temporary – on the surface, anyway.
