Requested by one of our readers was an article about maintenance works throughout the year.

I thought it would be nice to make a monthly series out of this.
This is part 9, in which I talk about the works in September. You can find the other parts here: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9.

Because the life of a gardener is tied to the weather and seasons, it is essential to mind the weather during each month described.

Japan with Prefectures by FreeVectorMaps.com

Japan is a long island, stretching from the North-East to the South-West and crosses several degrees of latitude. Plus it has a mountain range running from north to south, which will create different weathers in the west and east.
I will start each article with the average weather of that month focussing on Tokyo and Kyoto if possible.

The weather in September:
In September the typhoon season continues while the temperatures slowly drop.
The temperatures ranging from 27°C (81°F) during the day to 20°C (68°F) during the nights and we have four hours of average sunshine each day.
The average rainfall is 180 mm.

Works, which will be done in September:


Pruning of flowering shrubs (same as in August)
Several trees and shrubs flower in summer, for example, Hibiscus and Lagerstroemia indica. These plants can be cut directly after they ended flowering.
Other trees and shrubs shouldn’t be pruned now, because they already built new sprouts for flowering in the next year.

Fertilizing flowering trees and shrubs
Now is the right time to fertilize the flowering trees of summer, to support the formation of fruits and seeds.

 

Planting and Replanting of evergreen trees
In September is a good time to plant or replant evergreen trees. However, due to the typhoons, it is necessary to secure them thoroughly!

 

Repairing damage done by typhoons
After a typhoon, there is a lot of cleaning works for gardeners: branches of trees broke, whole trees fell over and stakings need to be renewed.

Lawn maintenance
Because the lawn starts to grow slower and the weather changes, watering and fertilizing isn’t necessary anymore. Mowing will be done once a month and the weeds should be removed before they build seeds.