Gardening column by Georgie Francis from Jimboomba Communty Garden

Hello and welcome to some cooler months ahead.

With winter approaching it is is important to take stock of what is around us, what survived and what we have to work with.

At home due to a limited rainfall and oppressively hot days I had to restrict my gardening efforts tyo certain areas. Lots of plants that were not coping with the heat were removed from the garden and put in pots and kept together in shade and others were dug up and moved to where I could water them all together.

Now i needed to work out if I have enough water in the dam to move them back or if I am going to keep them where they are.

My decision is to plant them back out, but only to areas that seemed to have survived the summer, which in my case is the areas that received mid day and afternoon shade.

So my preparation for this job is as always to prepare the area: 

Secondly is to prepare the plants i will remove any dead and undesirables from them while they are still in the pots.

I will then start to move the plants towards similar conditions that they will be receiving in their final spot.

So a plant that is only receiving 2-3 hours of direct sunlight will be moved to receive two more hours a day, every couple of days or so until it reaches an equal amount  that it will be receiving where it is planted.

This process is called hardening off and can take up to a month depending on the plant and your commitment . Unfortunately it is a process often out by larger establishments.

Then on the day before planting out I will dunk the whole pot into a weak solution of seaweed mixture and leave it for a couple of hours. This not only preps the plant for good root growth it swells the potting mix to hold more water and drowns any pests living in the pot.

Ideally the day I replant will be overcast, both for me and the plant.

Lastly looking around at what survived my Jasmine (trachelospermum) has hardly missed a beat so I will definitely be planting more as a ground cover to protect other plants next summer and planting a few more shade trees would also be a good idea.

Happy gardening