With the fluctuating temperatures we experienced towards the end of April, many trees, including figs and some citrus may have dropped their young fruits. Pomegranates are prone to this habit as well. There is nothing that can be done about that.  Figs will have a later crop, although the fruits will be smaller than the first crop would have been.  Some salad crops and broad beans will have bolted or gone over quickly and of course flowering plants like osteospermums will have dying flower heads every day, which should be picked off or the whole plant will die too. Do adopt a watering regime from now on as the weather settles into its summer pattern.

Some trees hold on to their leaves for a very long time.  Jacarandas, Tecoma stans and Duranta are particularly prone to this.  Sometimes, if you can reach, you have to help them along by removing the dying leaves. The flowers on Jacaranda trees will appear before the leaves if the tree has not been watered regularly, otherwise you will have abundant leaves before any flowers appear. There are lots of bugs about this month – greenfly and blackfly on citrus and some shrubs, which can disfigure them greatly and pollen beetles on Damascena roses, so deal with them before it is too late.  The Banksia roses, which are just going over, seem to escape being attacked.