September Gardening Guide

September is a bittersweet month in the allotment. After the languid heat of summer and early harvest, the bluster of autumn bonfires will not be far behind.  Hopefully you will still be enjoying cucumbers, onions, courgettes, lettuce, leeks and spinach. Potatoes and tomatoes should both be plentiful. Toward the end of the month,the last of the tomatoes may be taken inside to ripen.  Runner beans and French beans will be continuing to produce until the first bites of frost and the last of the peas should still be coming until then as well. Blackberries are at their best this month, tasting delicious just on their own or with cream and the elderberries seem to cry out to be made into the cordials and wines that will see you through the colder months til spring. While September mornings may be as bright as June’s, their warmth is waning and there is a chill to the evening air, making this liminal month the perfect time to appraise as well as to appreciate your harvest.

“Happily we bask in this warm September sun,
Which illuminates all creatures…”
–  Henry David Thoreau

There is a harmony
In autumn, and a luster in its sky…
~Percy Bysshe Shelley

A maiden born when September leaves
Are rustling in September’s breeze,
A sapphire
 on her brow should bind
`Twill cure diseases of the mind
.

 Wild is the music of autumnal winds, amongst the faded woods.

~William Wordsworth