Lawns are really starting to grow vigorously or is yours more weeds than turf. Well if it’s mostly weeds, try feeding your patch right now and the lawn grasses (if you have any left) will out compete the weeds and you have a fair chance of reinstating a sward of turf. You have a choice of organic pulverised pellets or water-soluble nutrients right now. I use both. The water-soluble nutrient is available to the lawn almost immediately and the organic dust in a week or so, but it’s the vital organic buffer a lawn needs.

If you grow Gardenias in the ground or in pots it’s a sure bet they now have yellow leaves and need both nitrogen and iron chelates. If you rely on using a complete mineral mix you get the nitrogen needed but the iron gets tied up in the alkaline soil. Apply your nitrogen as an organic mulch, water-soluble fertilizer or controlled release prills, but spray your iron chelates separately onto the underside of the foliage. Spraying iron chelates on the top of your Gardenia leaves results in a dirty brown stain.

Did you try sowing rose seed as I instructed back in winter? Well I sowed 10 seeds for Annie from her favourite ‘Shocking Blue’ that set a few hips and can report that some have germinated, so I hope you have had some luck too. Local rose breeder, George Thompson told me they should flower in their first year.

If you have a mottling on your citrus or vine leaves at present which does not respond to iron chelates and small leaves at the tips then there’s a fair chance you have a zinc deficiency showing up. It’s not something that needs to be done every year, but it does require foliar spraying as it gets locked up in the soil. The zinc is sold with manganese and since zinc corrodes the metal parts of your spray gear, clean thoroughly after spraying.

If you have a mottling on your citrus or vine leaves at present which does not respond to iron chelates and small leaves at the tips then there’s a fair chance you have a zinc deficiency showing up. It’s not something that needs to be done every year, but it does require foliar spraying as it gets locked up in the soil. The zinc is sold with manganese and since zinc corrodes the metal parts of your spray gear, clean thoroughly after spraying.

If you grow Gardenias or try to in the ground or in pots it’s a sure bet they now have yellow leaves and need both nitrogen and iron chelates to return to healthy green. If you rely on using a complete mineral mix you get the nitrogen needed, but the iron gets tied up in the alkaline soil. Apply your nitrogen as an organic mulch, water-soluble fertilizer or controlled release prills, but spray your iron chelates separately onto the underside of the foliage. Spraying iron chelates on the top of your Gardenia leaves results in a dirty brown stain.

With the high soil moisture at present and the resultant humidity, we can expect monumental outbreaks of bacterial shot hole on apricots and almonds in a few weeks. Although this unsightly leaf marking is caused by a bacterium we use fungicides to control it, such as Kocide or lime sulphur if you want a cheaper control. The shot hole also marks the fruit, making it rather unsightly for drying or fresh consumption however it still makes a fine jam from fresh or dried fruit. What you’ve never tasted dried apricot jam? You haven’t lived.

I was sent a little brochure from Mr Fothergill’s seed company recently (that’s the firm that Tim Yates started when he sold the family business a few years ago) and I mention it because they have done a cost benefit analysis for growing your own vegetables from seed. The savings are in the hundreds of dollars, depending on the your consumption and make compelling reading, certainly enough to ask your local supplier for a free copy.

I was asked on radio recently about Hoop Daffodils not flowering and subsequently received a letter from a dedicated reader of this column who passed on some Kevin Heinze wisdom that she was dished out many years ago in Melbourne. It was to half the clump every year, which she has been doing religiously ever since and now all her friends have them and they always flower. Thanks to you both.

Even Adelaide Hills lawns are starting to grow vigorously now or is yours more weeds than turf. Well if it’s mostly weeds, try feeding your patch right now and the lawn grasses (if you have any left) will out compete the weeds and you have a fair chance of reinstating a sward of turf. You have a choice of organic pulverised pellets or water-soluble nutrients right now. I use both. The water-soluble nutrient is available to the lawn almost immediately and the organic dust in a week or so, but it’s the vital organic buffer a lawn needs.

Last call to remind you that as spring flowering bulbs, like tulips, hyacinths and daffodils finish flowering they need feeding or you will not expect much flower next year. Similarly bulbs planted to flower in a shaded spot, will do that in their first year, but in subsequent years they will not. They need sun to be recurrent flowering subjects, so if that is your millstone, then purchase fresh bulbs each year!