Delicious Herbs, Vegies & More

“Bolting” Basil!

Basil has an exasperating habit of bolting to seed during hot weather, but you can trim off flowering stems to discourage bad behaviour. It's wise to repeat your basil sowings every two to three weeks, to keep up a constant supply.

Basil won’t mind a bit of shade during really hot weather, so you can plant it amongst other vegies, or even where shrubs offer some shade. Liquid feed using Yates Thrive All Purpose Liquid Plant Food, which is taken up through both the roots and foliage, as you water.

Pro Tip – bees love basil flowers, so if you do leave a few flowering stems on your basil for them, it's not a big sacrifice if you get little pollinators into the garden.

Chives

Chives are a wonderful herb to have on hand, not far from your kitchen door. Finely chopped and scattered onto salads, sandwiches, soups or pasta, they add that bit of extra zing that makes the difference. They may be mildly flavoured and scented, but they sure deliver a visual punch to your meals!

Chives grow in a clump (20-30cm tall) with fine dark green leaves and pretty edible purple flowers. You can sow these from seed now in all areas, directly where you want them to grow in the garden.

Use in rows or in clumps and they are also terrific in pots and useful as a pretty border plant. Chives grow well in full sun or part shade, and are a great companion for tomatoes, carrots and roses.

Feed regularly with Yates Thrive All Purpose Liquid Plant Food and chive plants will go on producing season after season.

Tomato Tips

Yates Success Ultra Insect Control will protect your tomatoes from tomato potato psyllid, a sap-sucking insect that causes lots of plant damage and can transmit diseases. Spray as soon as you see psyllid symptoms; repeat each week while the pests are in their active season. Adding Yates SprayFix will assist to give you the thorough leaf coverage you'll need.

Did you know that spinetoram, the active ingredient in Yates Success Ultra Insect Control, has a ‘trans-laminar’ action? This means it can move through the leaf, from the upper to the lower leaf surface, which really helps with getting good coverage and targeting all the insects.

It takes a lot of energy for tomatoes to grow trusses of delicious fruit. Keeping them well fed throughout the fruiting season is the key to a great summer harvest. Mixing 2 capfuls of Yates Thrive Natural Tomato Vegie Plant Food in a 9L watering can and applying it around your tomato plants each week, will help keep plants in top shape. It contains nitrogen to boost green leafy growth and it's enriched with potassium, for better flowering and fruiting.

Harvest Tips: Tomatoes taste best when vine-ripened, but hot afternoon sun can scorch (or even cook) them on the vine. During very hot weather, you can harvest tomatoes just as you see the first blush of colour, then ripen them indoors on a bright windowsill (or in a paper bag, along with a ripe banana to encourage the tomatoes to ripen).

Easy Pickings!

Carrots, radishes and baby beetroot can all go in now, grown from seed. Yates Radish 'Salad Crunch' is a quick, reliable and easy crop for kids to grow, and learn how to look after plants. The mild flavour also won't discourage kids from eating their harvests.

Try combining freshly harvested Yates Radish 'Salad Crunch' with some chilled watermelon chunks, for a sensational taste experience. Just quietly, 'Salad Crunch' was voted number one out of 24 varieties of radish in a summer trial conducted by New Zealand Gardener magazine!

Keep root vegies productive with regularly applications of a fast acting liquid fertiliser, like Yates Thrive All Purpose Liquid Plant Food. It contains all the balanced nutrients vegies need, for healthy leaf growth and robust root development.

One of the key ingredients for summer salads is lettuce; it’s so easy to grow your own!

Yates Lettuce 'Baby Combo' is an interesting blend of baby leaf lettuces that come in a range of attractive greens and reds. They'll happily grow in a vegie patch, but they're also ideal for containers. 'Baby Combo' is fast growing, and you can start cutting from just 6 weeks.

Easy steps to growing gourmet lettuce:

• Sprinkle  lettuce seeds in rows, into a garden bed or good-sized pot.
• Cover lightly with Yates Black Magic Seed Raising Mix, so the seeds are about 3mm below the surface.
• Keep the soil moist until tiny seedlings appear. You might need to thin out some of the smaller seedlings if they’re too close together (the ideal spacing is 20cm between plants).
• As the plants grow, water them regularly and apply some Yates Thrive All Purpose Soluble Plant Food. It's rich in nitrogen to encourage lots of tasty leaves.
• Harvest individual lettuce leaves regularly, so they’ll keep producing more.

Pro Tip: watch out for snails and slugs; they just love chomping through lettuces! Control them by scattering a few Yates Blitzem Pellets over the soil, around the lettuces.