Master My Garden Podcast

This weeks sponsors: 
Seeds Ireland High Quality Seeds: See link below for listener offer. 
https://seedsireland.ie/master
September is the month where a small, well-timed sowing list can make your whole winter feel easier. We’re looking at what to sow right now for steady, dependable harvests, especially if summer heat, holidays, or a brief pause in sowing has left gaps in your beds or polytunnel. If you want salad leaves on the plate when growth outside slows to a crawl, this is the reset button.

We walk through a clear, practical seed sowing guide for September, focusing on crops that earn their keep: loose-leaf lettuce for repeat picking, chard as a reliable staple, and kale sown now for spring harvests. We also cover winter salad favourites like winter purslane, mizuna, mustard and spinach, plus herbs such as coriander and chervil. For anyone who likes to experiment under cover, we talk about late sowings of beetroot and carrots in the polytunnel, what to expect, and why it can still be worth a try if you are short on supplies.

There’s a bigger lesson running underneath the list: the garden may feel warm, but the light is slipping away fast. We dig into the sharp drop in daylight hours through September, why sunlight intensity matters for seedlings, and a simple action that makes a real difference: cleaning greenhouse glass or polytunnel covers so every bit of light reaches your trays. We also touch on flowers you can still sow now, from perennials to sweet peas and biennials, and the wider idea of autumn planning for a more resilient garden.

A quick thanks as well to Seeds Ireland for sponsoring, with seed, spring-flowering bulbs, and autumn onion and garlic sets worth having on your radar. If this guide helps, please subscribe, share the episode with a gardening friend, and leave a review. What are you sowing first this September?
Support the show
If there is any topic you would like covered in future episodes, please let me know.
Email:  info@mastermygarden.com   

Check out Master My Garden on the following channels   
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/mastermygarden/ 
Instagram @Mastermygarden https://www.instagram.com/mastermygarden/  
 
Until next week  
Happy gardening  
John

Grow Your Own Herb Workshop Looking Forward To Seeing You here: 
https://subscribepage.io/growyourownherbalgarden
The weather doesn’t just “turn” anymore, it swings. One season can feel like weeks of soaked ground and flooding risk, followed by a fast flip into heat, drought and stressed plants. We’ve felt it in everything from delayed sowing to polytunnels that need watering at dawn, and crops that simply never size up without consistent moisture. So we’re stepping back and asking a more useful question: how do we build gardens that keep going when conditions get extreme? 

We share eight practical ways to make your garden more resilient, starting with a return to seasonal timing. Autumn planting gives shrubs, trees and hedging the rooting window they need to handle next year’s dry spells. We talk shelter too: protecting borders from wind, creating shade where it helps, and reducing bare soil so beds don’t lose water to evaporation. “Right plant, right place” becomes non-negotiable when a patch that was only mildly damp can now sit saturated for months. 

From there we get hands-on with water and soil. We discuss simple irrigation systems with timers for polytunnels and vegetable beds, why watering at night can be more effective, and how rainwater harvesting needs to scale beyond a single butt if you want real security during hosepipe bans. We also dig into mulching, organic matter, wood chip, grass clippings, and alternative growing systems like hugelkultur beds and food forest style planting that can store moisture and buffer extremes. 

If you enjoy practical gardening advice that matches the reality outside your back door, subscribe, share the episode with a gardening friend, and leave us a review. What weather shift is changing the way you garden this year?
Support the show
If there is any topic you would like covered in future episodes, please let me know.
Email:  info@mastermygarden.com   

Check out Master My Garden on the following channels   
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/mastermygarden/ 
Instagram @Mastermygarden https://www.instagram.com/mastermygarden/  
 
Until next week  
Happy gardening  
John

Grow Your Own Herb Workshop Looking Forward To Seeing You here: 
https://subscribepage.io/growyourownherbalgarden
Hosepipe bans, cracked soil, and then a day of rain so heavy it vanishes into runoff: if your garden has felt like it’s lurching between extremes, you’re not imagining it. We step back from the week-to-week frustration and look at what the data actually says about Irish weather, using Met Éireann observations to ground the conversation in facts rather than doom or wishful thinking. 

We talk through the big questions gardeners keep asking: is Ireland becoming drier, wetter, or just harder to predict? The answer is messy in a useful way. Recent years sit among the warmest on record since 1900, while rainfall totals can look “normal” even as individual months and 24-hour events become more intense. 

The most practical takeaway is about gardening strategy. When dry spells lengthen and downpours intensify, timing matters more than ever: autumn planting can help trees and shrubs establish before summer drought, while rushing bedding plants out in cold, wet spring conditions still backfires. We also tee up what comes next: smarter water storage, better soil structure, more organic matter, mulching, and borrowing lessons from woodland systems that hold moisture through heat. If you want a calmer, evidence-based way to plan your Irish garden around climate and weather extremes, hit play, then subscribe, share it with a gardening friend, and leave a review.
If there is any topic you would like covered in future episodes, please let me know.
Email:  info@mastermygarden.com   

Check out Master My Garden on the following channels   
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/mastermygarden/ 
Instagram @Mastermygarden https://www.instagram.com/mastermygarden/  
 
Until next week  
Happy gardening  
John  
Support the show
If there is any topic you would like covered in future episodes, please let me know.
Email:  info@mastermygarden.com   

Check out Master My Garden on the following channels   
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/mastermygarden/ 
Instagram @Mastermygarden https://www.instagram.com/mastermygarden/  
 
Until next week  
Happy gardening  
John

Grow Your Own Herb Workshop Looking For To Seeing You here: 
https://subscribepage.io/growyourownherbalgarden
Your garden can look “fine” in August while quietly running on empty. With weeks of heat and very little rain, plants lose that fresh, lush look, new plantings stall, and even reliable beds start to struggle. We talk honestly about what prolonged drought looks like on the ground, from yellowed lawns and thirsty borders to the knock-on effects you can see across the countryside.

We also dig into the surprising stuff, like why blackbirds and crows start stripping apples and other fruit when everything turns dry. From there, we get practical: how to think about rainwater harvesting, why water butts feel essential the moment a hosepipe ban arrives, and why the best time to set up storage is long before the next heatwave. I share what I’m changing with my own polytunnel setup, and how early-morning watering becomes the only workable option in extreme temperatures.

Then we move to recovery mode: choosing plants that genuinely cope, using mulch to cut evaporation and keep the root zone cooler, and bringing in liquid seaweed as a simple way to boost resilience once moisture returns. We also touch on why seed sowing can fail in high heat, and how to adapt plans for carrots and other crops. To wrap up, I share details of our autumn herbal grow-your-own workshop with Laura Darcy, focused on building immunity with herbs, teas, and tinctures. If this helped, please subscribe, share it with a fellow gardener, and leave a review so more people can find the show.
Support the show
If there is any topic you would like covered in future episodes, please let me know.
Email:  info@mastermygarden.com   

Check out Master My Garden on the following channels   
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/mastermygarden/ 
Instagram @Mastermygarden https://www.instagram.com/mastermygarden/  
 
Until next week  
Happy gardening  
John

You can grow a lot of things in a kitchen garden, but fruit is where the difference hits hardest. A homegrown apple or strawberry can make supermarket fruit taste flat, and that’s why we pull together our 10 essential fruits for a kitchen garden, with a focus on what actually works in Ireland and what still works when space is tight.

We start with the reality of gardening life: coming back from holidays, dealing with dry weather casualties, and the constant battle to keep plants watered without burning out. Then we get practical about the fruit that gives the biggest return, beginning with apples. We talk rootstocks for manageable trees, growing apples in pots, the basics of pruning and feeding, and why pollination partners matter. There’s also a very real warning about birds, including blackbirds stripping fruit when conditions are dry and water is scarce.

From there we move through strawberries for true seasonal flavour, raspberries for unbeatable freshness, and reliable choices like Victoria plum and Conference pear. We also cover currants as heavy-cropping, low-fuss bushes, grapes as a brilliant greenhouse or polytunnel project, and a few curveballs like gooseberries and blueberries, including the key detail that blueberries need acidic, ericaceous compost. We finish with rhubarb, the crop that gives and gives with remarkably little effort once established.

If you enjoy growing your own food, subscribe, share the episode with a gardening friend, and leave a review so more people can find the show. What’s on your personal list of 10 essential fruits?
This weeks sponsor: 
Crann From  Probio Carbon 
https://www.probiocarbon.ie

Support the show
If there is any topic you would like covered in future episodes, please let me know.
Email:  info@mastermygarden.com   

Check out Master My Garden on the following channels   
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/mastermygarden/ 
Instagram @Mastermygarden https://www.instagram.com/mastermygarden/  
 
Until next week  
Happy gardening  
John