July is often one of the hottest months of the year and a great time to sit out and enjoy your garden. Keep plants looking good by regularly dead-heading and you'll enjoy a longer display of blooms. Make sure you keep new plants well watered, using grey water where possible, and hoe off weeds, which thrive in the sunshine.
Top gardening jobs this month include: deadheading bedding plants and repeat-flowering perennials to ensure continuous flowering; caring for houseplants while on holiday — most will tolerate a few days' absence, but longer trips call for creative watering measures; watering tubs and new plants if dry, but being water-wise as roots need a balance of air and water to grow well; checking clematis for signs of wilt; picking courgettes before they become marrows; treating apple scab; clearing algae, blanket weeds and debris from ponds and keeping them topped up; ordering catalogues for next year's spring-flowering bulbs; giving the lawn a quick-acting summer feed if it didn't get a spring feed; and harvesting apricots, peaches and nectarines.