What to plant in June

Head gardener Benjamin Pope is here to make sure your garden looks great all year round. His practical gardening magazine column series continues all year round, and his tips on what to plant in June are a taster of what you can expect. For the full column, subscribe to Gardens Illustrated magazine.

Don't miss our suggestions of the best flowers in June, what gardens to visit and the gardening jobs for the month.

What to plant in June

Although the spring rush of sowing and planting has peaked, there are still things to keep busy with. I like to sow biennials and perennials now or next month, so that they reach a good size and can be planted out before winter arrives. I can’t resist the elegant spires of Digitalis in all its forms, from charming biennials, such as
Digitalis purpurea ‘Sutton’s Apricot’, to the perennial species, including Digitalis lutea and Digitalis parviflora.

Delicate Verbascum blattaria f. albiflorum is something I always like to have, informally dotting it around the edges of borders and paths.

For cutting or bedding out, it is worth sowing sweet Williams (Dianthus barbatus) and my preferred selections would be the vibrant ‘Oeschberg’, sumptuously dark ‘Sooty’, and the bi-colour ‘Purple Crown’ and ‘Sweet Pink Magic’.

In the vegetable patch there may be some succession sowing of beetroots and carrots or salad leaves and herbs, especially if your existing crops are harvesting now or beginning to bolt.

Any last-minute planting out to fill the odd gap can also be done now and I find using quick-growing annuals such as Bupleurum rotundifolium, calendula and tagetes very successful, although it’s worth remembering these plants will need additional watering to help them establish, especially if the weather is hot and dry.