What We’re Doing in the Garden This September
September is here, and after such a long, dry summer, the rain has finally returned. Almost overnight, everything seems green again. The grass is growing, and the garden is bouncing back to life.
September is one of the busiest and most rewarding months in the Fat Tomato garden. Some pears and apples have already been picked earlier than usual after the hot summer. Blackberries are everywhere, sloes are colouring in the hedgerows, and the tomatoes are finally arriving in abundance. Pumpkins and squash are swelling, and the kitchen is filling with pots, jars, bottles and trays as we preserve as much of the harvest as possible. Anything we don't have time to process now heads to the freezer, ready for the quieter winter months.
If you're wondering what to sow in September in Ireland, there's still plenty to grow. We're sowing hardy winter salads and greens, beetroot, preparing beds for garlic and overwintering onions, planting green manures, and already thinking about what we want to harvest next spring.
But September is about more than sowing. It's one of our biggest seed-saving months too. We collect seeds from tomatoes, beans, herbs, vegetables, and flowers, then carefully dry and label them for growing again. Some will become part of the Fat Tomato seed collection; others will simply return to the garden next year.
At the same time, we're slowly beginning to prepare the garden for winter — clearing finished crops, feeding the beds, tidying the polytunnel, and making notes on what worked, what didn't, what tasted best, and what we want to do differently next year.
That's September in a nutshell: harvesting one season, preserving it for later, and quietly beginning the next.
Our September List
Harvesting tomatoes
After their slow start this summer, the tomatoes are finally making up for lost time. We’re picking regularly from both the polytunnel and outdoor beds, tasting varieties, selecting the best fruit for seed saving, and sending basket after basket into the kitchen, and some to the honesty farm shop.
September is when tomatoes begin to take over everything here — bottling, preserving, fermenting, drying and turning them into our small-batch condiments. We’ll continue removing lower leaves and topping indeterminate plants, so their remaining energy goes into ripening the fruit already on the vines rather than producing lots of new growth.
Picking pears, apples and damsons
The orchard is becoming a daily job. Pears are being picked as they are ripe, while apples are beginning to come thick and fast. Some will be eaten straight from the tree, some stored, and plenty will make their way into the Fat Tomato kitchen. We check the trees regularly rather than harvesting everything at once, as every variety has its own timetable.
Gathering wild berries and hedgerow fruit
September means baskets, buckets and stained hands. Blackberries are abundant this year, and we’re also watching the elderberries, sloes, bullaces, haws and rosehips as they ripen around us. These wild and hedgerow fruits are an important part of our autumn kitchen and will find their way into preserves such as our Hedgerow Jelly and new Hedgerow Butter.
Saving seeds
September is one of the most important seed-saving months of our year. We deliberately leave some of our best plants to mature fully so we can collect seed from them. Flavour is always important when deciding which plants we save from — if something tastes exceptional, we want to grow it again.
Tomatoes, beans, peas, herbs and flowers are all being collected, cleaned and dried. Before long, the house will once again be full of trays, old jam jars and labels with notes on them.
Sowing winter greens and salads
There is still plenty to sow in September. We’re sowing spinach, winter purslane, lamb’s lettuce, corn salad, chard, kale and other hardy leaves for autumn and winter picking. We sow some in modules for planting out later and others directly in the polytunnel, where the extra protection can keep fresh leaves coming through the colder months.
Preparing for garlic and overwintering onions
We’re starting to prepare beds for garlic and overwintering onions, which will be planted over the coming weeks. As always, we’ll replant some of the best garlic from our own harvest and supplement it with organic planting stock from Fruit Hill Farm.
Sowing green manures
As summer crops finish, not every empty bed needs another vegetable. We sow green manures such as mustard, clover and phacelia in some areas to cover and protect the soil, suppress weeds and add organic matter. Bare soil is something we try to avoid wherever possible.
Looking after pumpkins and winter squash
Pumpkins and squash are swelling nicely now, but we’re not rushing to harvest them. We remove some leaves around the fruit to improve light and airflow, and place larger fruit on slate or another dry surface to keep them off damp soil. The aim is to leave them growing and ripening for as long as possible before harvesting ahead of the first proper frosts.
Other Jobs Around the Garden
Lift remaining potatoes and store them somewhere cool, dark and dry.
Prune summer-fruiting raspberries once they’ve finished cropping.
Keep harvesting courgettes, cucumbers, beans and other productive summer crops while they last.
Start tidying pots, supports and growing areas as crops finish.
Keep an eye on nighttime temperatures as the days shorten.
Take notes on varieties that performed particularly well — or badly — while the season is still fresh in our minds.
Seeds for the Season Ahead
September might feel like the end of the growing season, but in many ways, it’s the beginning of the next one. We still have hardy salads and winter greens to sow, garlic and onions to prepare, and seeds to save for next year.
You’ll find our collection of open-pollinated, Irish-saved seeds in the online store and at the Honesty Farm Shop. All of them have been grown, selected and saved right here in our edible garden in North Wexford.
We’re also busy working through germination testing, drying, packing and labelling seeds from this year’s harvest, with more varieties being added as they’re ready.
Whether you're picking the last of your summer crops, filling the freezer with blackberries or sowing something for winter, September is a good reminder that the gardening year never really ends.
Until next month, happy growing — and don't worry if your garden isn't perfect. Ours certainly isn't.