Bounty on a budget

PART 4- Continuing her six-part series, veg growing expert Sally Nex looks at how to pick your crops at just the right time, stay ahead of garden pests, and save seed for next year

- Sally Nex

The veg garden slips into cruise mode this month: each of the beds has filled out nicely as plants reach their full size, and it's a job to find bare soil for your monthly sowings of salads and baby roots. Best of all, you're picking something fresh to eat from the garden every day.

While you're there, you can also gather perhaps the most important harvest of all. Nearly everything in the veg garden starts with a seed: yet commercially-grown seed can be expensive, and often comes with a high carbon footprint, plus extra single-use plastic packaging. Buy from organic seed merchants who produce their seed here in the UK, or simply save your own, for free, instead.

August can be a tricky month in the garden, too, as caterpillars fatten and blight spores germinate, and it can feel like you're spending most of your time responding to emergencies. So, read on for eco-friendly veg-growing tips to keep your garden healthy and productive well into autumn.

Ready to pick

The harvest is still in full swing, with courgettes, beans, salads, leafy greens, and calabrese offering a mouth-watering daily menu. This month, you can add the first buttery sweetcorn cobs: you'll know they're ripe when the tassels turn dark brown and the cob feels rounded and full. Gently peel back the papery sheath: if kernels are plump and yellow, and ooze milky juice when pierced with a thumbnail, set the pot to boil and pick the cob just before you cook to capture the rich flavours at their sweetest.