Summer s here. Can I put my feet up yet

A.� To some extent, but not completely. All being well, it should be one of the most rewarding times in the garden. With most of the donkey work over it's about tweaking and fine tuning to help get the most out of the garden for as long as possible.

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A.� The heavy rain of winter and early spring will have taken its toll in places and some of us, especially on poorer soils, may find bald patches as we start mowing regularly. It's not too late to sow seed or turf. Mark out the area that needs attention, remove around two inches of topsoil and either lay new turf or replace with fine soil or compost and seed, watering regularly until established. If you're sowing seed you may want to net the area to keep off birds until the new grass is established.

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A. Pelagoniums should be planted out as summer bedding and in hanging baskets and young dahlia plants should go into the borders.

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A.� Aphids will be gathering on things like roses and now is the time to take action to ensure they don't spoil the show. Either use a general insecticide spray on greenfly, blackfly, etc or use a sprayer filled with well-diluted washing up liquid. If you don't want to spray anything at all put in aphid attractors like African Marigolds to draw the pests away from your prized blooms.

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A.� Looking to next year, it is time to lift and divide early flowerers like primroses, bearded irises and polyanthus, removing them to a shady corner, and carry on removing spring bulb foliage after six weeks.

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Make sure to deadhead annuals to promote longer flowering and keep the hoe handy, both in the flower and veg garden, to keep down those all too vigorous weeds.

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