` VEGETABLES – have you got your supplies of runner bean, pumpkin, courgette and squash seeds yet? – they can be sown under cover from early May for planting out from early June. For those of you with a heated glasshouse, you can buy and pot up or plant out tomatoes, peppers and cucumbers now as day-length and light levels increase. Sow some autumn cauliflowers now in a seed bed ready for planting out in May and continue to sow salad crops between the rows of slower growing crops such as leeks and onions.
` FRUIT – plant strawberries in well-prepared in a warm, sunny position – it is best to remove the flowers in the first season to help the parent plant develop but it is your choice. Keep an eagle eye open for the first Gooseberry Sawfly larvae and hand pick them to reduce damage.
If your apples suffer from Codling Moth damage, look out for pheromone traps to hang in the trees from May onwards to trap the male moths.
