September Garden Calendar
Vegetables and Fruits
- Continue to harvest vegetables
- Pick apples and pears and store in a cool place to extend freshness
- Harvest pumpkins when flesh is completely orange and avoid carrying by stem
- Harvest winter squash when rind is hard enough to puncture with fingernail
- Plant lettuce, spinach, and radishes
- Remove weeds from garden plantings before going to seed
- Herbs can be dug from garden and placed in pots for indoor use this winter
- Remove small tomatoes from their vines to increase late development of more mature fruits
Flowers
- Plant spring flowering bulbs, tulips, daffodils, and others
- Dig, divide, or plant peonies
- Divide perennials, especially spring bloomers
- Remove seedheads from perennials to prevent reseeding in the garden
- Plant chrysanthemums for fall color
- Dig gladiolus as foliage begins to yellow and air dry before storing for winter
- Clean up garden areas to reduce insects and disease as plants dieback for winter
- Enrich soil by adding organic matter such as peat moss or compost
Lawns
- Plant or sod new bluegrass or tall fescue lawns
- Renovate bluegrass or tall fescue lawns by verticutting
- Core aerate cool season turf
- Fertilize cool season grasses with high nitrogen sources of fertilizer
- Mow turf at 2 to 3 inches and sharpen blade for a clean cut
Trees and Shrubs
- Plant trees and shrubs, deciduous and evergreen
- Rake up fallen leaves and compost
- Prune broken and dead branches from trees
- Avoid pruning spring flowering shrubs such as lilac and forsythia to ensure spring flowers
- Hand pick bagworms to reduce problem in future
Houseplants
- Bring plants in before temperatures drop into the fifties
- Clean and wash before moving indoors to reduce insects
- Fertilize before winter conditions arrive and growth slows
- Poinsettias can be forced into Christmas bloom by starting dark treatment of short days
