With the wet summer and autumn, gardening writer JACKIE WARBURTON is keeping up her spraying of copper on all her stone fruit trees.

PARTICULARLY after the wet summer and autumn I am continuing to spray copper for shot holes and leaf curl, and brown rot on cherries.

With many fungal diseases, prevention is better than cure and is better for the longevity and health of the tree and its ability to produce fruit. 

Copper ultimately impairs cellular function in viruses, fungi and bacteria. It causes them to collapse and prevent spores from producing and drying out. 

Copper sprays are harmful to aquatic life and soil organisms, so it’s important not to treat the ground or around ponds or water baths for wildlife. Spray copper in the cool of the day and not near flowering plants in the garden as it can be harmful for bees. 

PLUM trees can be planted now and through winter. It’s cheaper to buy bare-rooted plants from the nursery, but they need to be planted as soon as they come home. 

Japanese plums have red flesh and European plums, yellow. The European plums are semi fertile, but do much better with a correct pollinator to get the tree to fruit. 

They need space to grow as most plums are small-spreading trees with hanging fruit. 

A pair of European plums that have been successful for me are “Angelina” and “President”, providing an abundance of fruit and lovely trees in the garden. There are many pollination charts available online to help decide the right tree to grow. 

COMMON winter herbs that grow well and can be used in cooking are sage, parsley, rosemary and oregano. They are great evergreen plants and, in the winter garden, fill bare spots and protect the soil from the elements. Most of my herbs get cut back hard in spring to make space for frost-tender salad herbs to grow. 

ANYONE interested in growing feijoas should check out the grove of them planted at the Lindsay Pryor National Arboretum. For the home garden, one tree will grow fruit, but two trees make them perform better. 

Feijoa is one of my favourite shrubs because of its multiple uses: it can be an evergreen hedge with aromatic beautiful flowers in summer and delicious fruit in winter. It’s hardy and perfect for our climate. With a maximum growth height of about five metres, they’re perfect for under the powerlines when minimal pruning is required.

ALL berries should be pruned now, including young berries and raspberries. Prune autumn-fruiting berries to the ground, but for summer fruiting berries, only remove old canes and leave canes that haven’t fruited and tie back to a trellis. Keep the base of the canes weed free and feed with compost and mulch for the winter. 

WEEDS are going to be in abundance this year and removing them before they flower will prevent them being a problem next year. 

A GOOD prune of roses should get rid of hips, old flower heads and unwanted growth. August is pruning time, but for now remove all leaf litter and spray all stems with copper and repeat a few times a year. There has been an increase of insects and pests with the wet weather and hopefully a few good frosts will sort them out. 

jackwar@home.netspeed.com.au