It's August, it's autumn and it's now time to start looking at your vegetables and possibly harvesting them. This week 2fm's John Bela Reilly and John Adamson of helpmegarden.ie look into peas, pests and next season's soil.

Peas
If you have peas it is vital that you harvest as many as you can to encourage new growth in the weeks ahead. If you have a large crop you can blanch them and put them in bags in the freezer for later use.   Ensure you are not letting any of your crop go to seed as this will take away from the flavour.  Preventing potato and tomato blight by protecting plants with copper fungicide is vital as discarded potatoes from last year carry disease over and can pose a threat to this year's crops.  We had a slight warning this week so keep your ear out for blight warnings on RTE news broadcasts.

Pests and blight

Pests are also building up with influxes of blackfly into the runner and French Beans, beetroot with cabbage aphid and cabbage butterfly, and moth caterpillars in the brassicas.  Organic sprays and nematodes are ideal solutions.

Maintaining soil

Refrain from walking on soil you wish to grow crops in. Doing so damages the natural structuring of the soil, compressing it, and making it difficult to dig and weed.  Good soil should be teaming with bacteria and worms. Trampling on it will reduce the diversity of life in it and in term, affect fertility levels.  Also, it reduces the amount of air available to the soil.  If you need to cross a patch, use a good plank of wood to distribute your body weight. The soil will compress slightly, but not enough to cause lasting damage.