As the early summer blooms fade, prairie favourites such as rudbeckia, helenium and coreopsis add a blaze of colour to sunny borders. These late-flowering stalwarts attract butterflies and bees, while dragonflies patrol our ponds and the vegetable harvest is in full swing. August is a great time to collect and store seed, ready for sowing next year. Other jobs this month include sowing crops like salad leaves and winter radish, and deadheading spent blooms to prolong flowering. Although many plants benefit from deadheading, leave rose hips and seedheads like knapweed, teasel and sunflowers to provide food for the birds.
In this collection of clips from BBC Gardeners’ World, Monty is busy pruning and training his roses now their summer flowering period is over. He shares his design tips on adding plants to new borders and demonstrates how to take stem cuttings of shrubs. With recent increases in summer temperatures, it is important to select plants that can cope with heatwave conditions. In the final clip, Monty chooses drought-tolerant Mediterranean herbs for a container display which will continue to thrive however hot the weather.
Pruning rambling roses
Rambling roses look magnificent growing through mature trees and need little pruning, but ramblers growing up walls do benefit from regular training and cutting back. Monty’s vigorous rambling rose ‘Felicite Perpetue’ needs pruning, so he demonstrates how to remove the old wood and tie in the new growth that will carry next year’s flowers.
Adding shrubs to bare borders
Monty is working on the design of a newly established border, in this clip. He adds shrubs to fill bare spaces, including Perovskia ‘Blue Spire’ and Hypericum x hidcoteense ‘Hidcote’, placing all of his plants first so he can see how they look.
Planting up a Mediterranean herb pot
Mediterranean herbs are ideal as container plants. They love full sun and are resilient in even the hottest, driest conditions. In this clip, Monty plants up a herb pot with prostrate rosemary and two types of thyme: lemon thyme and common thyme. He explains when to cut plants back to keep them looking good for years.
Propagating philadelphus
Monty shows how to propagate philadelphus. He shares his tips on the best ways to take cuttings and explains which other shrubs can be propagated in a similar way.
