Get growing edibles in August

More fruit and veg growing inspiration:

• Your August fruit and veg jobs
• August fruit and veg with Monty

August fruit and veg inspiration

Get squash up on bricks

The winter squash and pumpkins are getting big and starting to ripen and deepen in colour now. That’s my cue to go round lifting each fruit up on bricks so they’re clear of the ground. This stops them getting splashed by soil or munched by slugs, and lets the air right round the fruit so the skins dry evenly.

• How to grow pumpkins and squash

Spray courgettes against mildew

Every courgette plant I’ve ever grown gets mildew towards the end of summer, but if you get in there early before the leaves turn white and powdery and start spraying them with a 50:50 mix of milk and water I find it really helps. It’s thought the lactose in the milk reacts with sunlight to make a natural fungicide.

• How to grow courgettes

Prune summer raspberries

After I’ve picked all the fat, luscious summer raspberries it’s time for an end-of-season sort out. It’s a quick job to snip out fruited stems to the ground; then select five strong new canes from each plant to tie in to supports, removing the rest. Water generously then mulch with compost and they’re ready for next year.

• How to prune summer-fruiting raspberries

Make new strawberry plants

I find strawberries crop well for about three years then tail off – so in year three I get the next generation going by rooting a few runners from my best plants. I sink 10cm pots of compost into the ground alongside the plants, then pin a runner on top with bent wire: they root within about six weeks.

• How to propagate strawberries from runners

Take herb cuttings

I can never have too many herb plants – so I’ll often make my own by taking cuttings. Scented-leaf pelargonium cuttings root quickly taken now; and heeled cuttings are almost foolproof. These are young shoots peeled from woody herbs like lemon verbena, bay, sage or rosemary with a little bark attached, for extra root-forming cambium so they take really easily.

• Culinary herbs to grow

Collect lettuce seed

I often let lettuces flower once I’ve picked my fill so I can collect next year’s seed. The flower spikes are tall, so you’ll need to stake them. Once they turn brown shake the seeds out into a bucket. Sieve them to remove as much chaff as you can, then tip the cleaned seed into a paper envelope.

• How to grow lettuce
• How to save your own veg seed

Remove lower leaves from tomatoes

I can never grow enough tomatoes: whatever I don’t eat fresh I cook down and freeze in 400-gram batches – one batch equals a tin of tomatoes. It’s a race now to ripen them before the cold weather arrives, so remove any big leaves which are shading fruit so the sunshine can get to their skins.

• How to ripen late tomatoes

Keep picking!

The most important job this month is to keep picking so you catch all your produce at its best. Mind you, whatever I do I seem to find the occasional courgette that’s turned into a marrow or overgrown, stringy beans. But I pick them anyway to keep my harvest coming - at least they make good compost!

• Six crops to harvest in August