June is a pivotal month for Canadian gardeners, marking the transition from the last frosts to the full growing season. It's a time of intense activity where every action counts to ensure a bountiful harvest and a flourishing garden. This guide provides an overview of essential tasks, adapted for hardiness zones 3, 4, and 5 in Quebec.
The Vegetable Garden in June: Seeding, Transplanting, and Soil Prep
June is a crucial month for your veggie patch. Good soil preparation and plant acclimatization are key to successful crops. It's the ideal time for direct seeding and transplanting plants you've started indoors, always considering your specific zone's frost dates.
Direct Seeding (Outdoors)
- Zones 3 and 4: From early to mid-June, sow beans and corn once all risk of frost has passed. Keep up with succession planting for radishes, carrots, beets, lettuces, and spinach for continuous harvests. If your soil is nice and warm (at least 16°C for beans, 10°C for corn, 15°C for squash/cucumbers), you can also sow squash and cucumbers.
- Zone 5: Early June (or late May) is prime time for sowing beans and corn. Continue succession planting of leafy greens and root vegetables. Direct seeding of squash, cucumbers, and melons is also an option.
Don't forget these other excellent choices for June planting:
- Parsnips: Mid-May to mid-June
- Rutabaga: Early June to early July
- Kale: May and June
- Kohlrabi: Late May to late June
Transplanting (After Acclimatization)
- Zones 3 and 4: From early to mid-June, transplant tomatoes, peppers, eggplants, squash, cucumbers, and other tender fruit vegetables, along with frost-sensitive annual flowers like petunias and begonias.
- Zone 5: Late May to early June is the perfect window for these same plants.
Acclimatization is vital for the survival of plants started indoors. If you haven't started already, do it now! Gradually expose young plants to outdoor conditions over 7 to 10 days.
How to Acclimatize Your Plants:
- Days 1-3: Place your plants outdoors for 2 to 4 hours daily in a shady, wind-sheltered spot.
- Days 4-6: Increase to 4 to 6 hours daily and expose them to a bit more indirect light, but steer clear of intense direct sun.
- Days 7-10: Extend to 6 to 8 hours daily, including a few hours of direct morning or late afternoon sun. If nights are mild (above 12°C), you can leave them out overnight.
Key things to remember:
- Avoid temperatures below 12°C (54°F).
- Opt for cloudy, rain-free, or windless days.
- Ensure the soil stays moist. Young plants dry out quicker outdoors.
Don't wait too long to transplant your fruit vegetables—the growing season in Quebec is short!
Tip: Consider adding Botanix Composted manure with peat, seaweed and crustaceans when you plant to encourage strong growth. It'll provide essential nutrients and improve soil structure for a great start.
General Yard and Garden Maintenance
June is a month where regular upkeep is crucial for the health and productivity of your entire landscape, from flowerbeds to trees and shrubs. Adopting good habits now will help your plants flourish and withstand summer's challenges.
- Watering: Water deeply at the base of plants, not the foliage, 1 to 2 times a week. This promotes strong roots and helps prevent fungal diseases. Morning is ideal to minimize evaporation.
- Mulching: Apply a 5 to 7.5 cm (2 to 3 inches) layer of organic mulch (cedar, BRF, straw, wood chips) around your plants. Leave a 10 to 15 cm (4 to 6 inches) gap around stems and trunks. Mulch helps retain moisture, suppress weeds, and regulate soil temperature.
- Weeding: Weed regularly, especially after a rainfall when the soil is soft. Always pull out the entire root to prevent regrowth. Hoeing can also be beneficial as it aerates the soil and disrupts weed growth.
Consider these natural weeding solutions:
- Boiling Water: A drastic solution for tough weeds like nettles or quackgrass in cracks or pathways.
- White Vinegar: Effective against young shoots. It's recommended to mix 200 ml of white vinegar with 1 litre of water and a few drops of dish soap. Be cautious, as it can acidify the soil.
- Baking Soda: Can be used on paved surfaces. Dilute 200g in 1 litre of hot water.
Pest and Disease Monitoring
Inspect your plants regularly for early detection of pests and diseases. Quick action is essential!
Common Pests to Watch For:
- Aphids: A strong spray of water or insecticidal soap can get rid of them.
- Colorado Potato Beetles: Hand-pick them from your plants, or consider a biological insecticide if the infestation is severe.
- Cucumber Beetles: Use floating row covers at seeding or planting for protection.
- Mexican Bean Beetles: Insect netting can be very effective in stopping them from laying their eggs.
- Grubs: Beneficial nematodes can help control these soil pests.
Common Diseases:
- Blossom End Rot: Affects tomatoes, peppers, squash, and watermelons. Often caused by irregular watering and a lack of calcium in the soil. Ensure uniform moisture, mulch your plants, and consider a calcium-rich fertilizer.
- Fungal Diseases: Like scab and powdery mildew. Avoid overhead watering, especially in the evening, as wet foliage creates an ideal environment for fungi.
Prevention is always the best approach:
- Keep your garden clean and free of debris.
- Plant strong-smelling repellent plants that deter pests, such as garlic, basil, lavender, thyme, and marigolds.
- Sticky traps can help monitor and control flying insects.
Staking, Pinching, and Thinning
- Staking: Provide support for tall plants like tomatoes and cucumbers. Staking improves air circulation, which reduces diseases, and keeps fruits clean.
- Pinching: For indeterminate tomatoes, pinch off "suckers" (small shoots in the leaf axil and stem).
- Thinning: Thin out crowded vegetable seedlings (especially root vegetables) to ensure proper spacing.
The Lawn: Green and Healthy
In June, your lawn is in full growth and needs special attention to stay dense, green, and resilient. Here are the key tasks for a vibrant lawn:
- Apply lawn fertilizer, step 2, to promote healthy growth and a nice green colour. Opt for natural fertilizers as they nourish the soil deeply. Water generously after applying to help the nutrients penetrate the soil.
- Water about 2.5 cm (1 inch) of water per week, taking rain into account. Tip: Place an empty container to measure the water received. Water early in the morning so the water can soak in before evaporating and the grass blades can dry before night, which reduces the risk of disease.
- Maintain a mowing height of 6 to 8 cm (2.5 to 3 inches) to encourage deeper roots and help the grass resist drought and weeds. Practice "grasscycling"—leaving grass clippings on the lawn allows them to decompose and return valuable nutrients to the soil.
- Overseed and repair sparse areas. Add a thin layer of quality topsoil (about 0.5 cm) over the lawn before seeding. Water regularly to ensure good germination of young shoots.
Trees and Shrubs: Selection, Planting, and Care
This is the perfect time to add trees and shrubs to your landscape and care for those already enhancing your yard. Whether you're looking to create shade, add colour, or structure your space, now is the ideal time to act. Our garden centres offer a wide selection of plants adapted to our Quebec climate.
Suggested adapted, low-maintenance varieties to plant:
- Trees: Canada Serviceberry (Amelanchier canadensis) for spring flowers and edible berries, Amur Maple (Acer ginnala) for spectacular fall foliage, or certain ornamental Crabapple Trees (Malus domestica) for their gorgeous blooms.
- Shrubs: Spireas (Spiraea spp.) for their abundant and varied blooms and Panicle Hydrangeas (Hydrangea paniculata) for their impressive summer blooms.
Pruning
- Fruit Trees: Perform "green pruning" from mid-June to late July to remove suckers and watersprouts at the base. Don't remove more than 5 to 10% of the foliage at a time to avoid stressing the tree.
- Spring-Flowering Shrubs: Prune these shrubs immediately after they finish blooming in June (e.g., lilacs, forsythias, spring spireas). Pruning after flowering ensures you don't cut off next year's flower buds, which form on old wood.
- Cedar Hedges: Trim your hedges in June, cutting about one-third of the new green growth. This encourages a dense, compact hedge and allows enough regrowth before winter.
Flowerbeds and Perennials: Brilliance and Durability
In June, your flowerbeds and perennials are buzzing with activity, or getting ready to! Perennials are champions of resilience; they return year after year to beautify your garden. June is an excellent month to plant them or give them some care.
Some popular and hardy perennial varieties to plant:
When choosing perennials, consider their hardiness, light requirements, and mature size.
- For full sun (6+ hours): Daylilies (Hemerocallis),Black-Eyed Susans (Rudbeckia), Coneflowers (Echinacea), Coreopsis, Tall Garden Phlox (Phlox paniculata), and Lavender.
- For partial shade (3-6 hours of sun, ideally morning): Hostas, Astilbes, Heuchera, and Bleeding Hearts (Dicentra spectabilis).
Care Tips:
- Add a layer of cedar mulch or other organic mulch around your perennials. This helps retain moisture, suppress weeds, and keep the soil cool.
- Deadhead faded flowers to encourage continuous blooming and prevent the plant from wasting energy on seed production.
- Stake taller varieties to prevent them from flopping over in wind or rain.
- Divide late-blooming perennials if they become too large or bloom less vigorously.
- Fertilize with Botanix 100% natural fertilizer for annuals, perennials, and roses 4-3-8 every 4 weeks until mid-August.
Annuals
Plant frost-sensitive annuals when night temperatures consistently stay above 15°C. Hanging baskets and containers are perfect for showcasing colourful annuals. For potted annuals, fertilize with a diluted liquid fertilizer every four waterings to keep them vigorously blooming throughout the season.
Small Fruits Care: A Sweet Treat
Growing your own small fruits means a delicious harvest and sweet enjoyment all summer long. Whether newly planted or established, small fruits need regular watering, mulching, and pest monitoring to thrive.
- Raspberries: For summer-fruiting varieties (which fruit once in summer), prune canes that have finished fruiting by cutting them to the ground after harvest. For everbearing varieties (which produce a first crop in summer and a second in fall), prune the canes that produced in the fall. Planting Forget-me-nots at the base of the plants can help deter the raspberry beetle (Byturus tomentosus).
- Blueberries: Blueberries require very acidic soil (pH 4.5-5.0). If your soil isn't naturally acidic, or if its acidity decreases over time, use an acidifier for acid-loving plants or a fertilizer formulated for blueberries. An annual application of acidic peat moss on the surface helps maintain pH. Consistent watering is vital for healthy blueberry production.
- Currants and Gooseberries: Very hardy (zone 3). They prefer cool, humus-rich, and slightly acidic soils. Water regularly and watch for pests like aphids.
Remember, every garden is unique! If you have specific questions about your plants, particular challenges, or if you're looking for the right products for your projects, our garden centre experts are here to help. Don't hesitate to visit us in store; we'll be happy to share our knowledge and help you make your garden a true success. Enjoy every moment spent in your garden!
