Jobs in the garden: September

Apples growing on a tree

Here's what to do this month in your fruit and vegetable garden

It's time to...

  • Pick ripe apples and store the best in individual plastic bags
  • Save seeds from good varieties of beans, herbs and tomatoes that you've enjoyed this year
  • Pot up a few herbs to bring into a porch or grow on the window sill
  • Prune out fruited blackberry stems and tie in new shoots to supports
  • Take hardwood cuttings from fruit bushes
  • Harvest haricot beans and globe artichokes
  • Sow broad beans and hardy peas for early crop next year
  • Harvest pears, plums and gages as they ripen
  • Plant out garlic in mild areas, or start cloves in pots to transplant later
  • Net autumn raspberries and blackberries to protect them from birds
  • Dig up strawberry runners and pot them up
  • Lift and dry maincrop potatoes and store in paper sacks in a cool, dark place

What’s in and what’s out

Vegetables to sow now include spring cabbages, Japanese onions, turnips for green tops, winter lettuces, spinach, endive, corn salad, baby salad leaves and spring onions.

This feature originally appeared on the Gardeners' World website.

To find out what jobs you should be doing now in your garden, as well as gardening tips and advice, visit Gardeners World - what to do now.