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With White Fly, Aphids, Scale,
Mealy Bugs and Mites now in plague proportions, due to the early seasonal rains and cooler
nights, you will find that you need some control, because the Assassin Flies and Mantids
that are their natural predators, cannot multiply quickly enough at this time of year. Last season University of Western Sydney released their safe
synthetic mineral oil, marketed by Ampol, but I notice this year it’s being packaged
and sold through different outlets by Hortex™. The product is ‘PestOil’ and
it is a useful safe control of the above sap-sucking pests that will not kill your natural
insect vectors or predators in the garden.
Liliums in the garden are starting to look quite yellow and
will soon be brown, as they become winter dormant. Even at the yellow stage they can be
cut down, leaving a neck at ground level of about 10cm, so you remember where they are.
You can mulch these Lilium clumps with organic pellets as
soon as they are cut down. The pellets break down slowly over winter and the nutrients
leach down to where the bulb root systems are, so when they start their growth in spring,
they make big fat stems rapidly and flower at least two weeks earlier.
If you are cutting down shabby looking perennials this
early in the season, you will notice they quickly make basal growths or rosettes that
won’t usually continue to grow in winter. These rosettes make very rapid spring
growth and may even need heading back, which is a late spring trim, or else they get too
tall and spreading. That’s fine if you have the room, but if you want slender flowers
quickly, leave cutting your perennials for another month.
When planting winter-flowering annual seedlings such as
Pansies, Poppies, Cinerarias, Antirrhinums and Primulas over the next few weeks, remember
that the autumn sun is weak at soil level and not to mulch them. They need all the warmth
they can get. Mulch in early spring for sure, but if you have lots of it around your
seedlings, pull it back to let the sun in. |
