Gardening in Mbabane
Hhohho · Southern Savanna & Subtropical Coast · hardiness zone 10b
New here? Start with the gardening introNow
17°C · Clear
Today
18° / 13°
Soil 6 cm
16°C
First frost
~251 days (Jun 15)
Weather read at 12:37 a.m..
The garden year · Mbabane
Growing
Water, weed, stake, pick the first things, and sow the fall crops.
- First peas and greens
- Sow fall carrots and brassicas
- Watch for pests
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today❄ last frost❄ first frost
44 days since the last frost, about -114 until the first.
The main harvest starts in about 26 weeks; sow the fall carrots and brassicas now.
Frost watch · Mbabane
No frost in the next seven days — the coldest night is 12 °C. The average first frost is about 251 days off; pick the tender things before it, not after.
Coming out of the garden now
What’s ready in Mbabane in October
The first pickings, and the crops to keep sowing for autumn.
Very hardyPerennialsPicked Apr–JunRhubarb
The first harvest of the Canadian year and the toughest plant in the garden — eat the stalks, never the leaves.
Freezing · Water-bathPick, store, put up →
Very hardyRootsPicked Mar–NovParsnips
The one root that wants a hard frost before it is worth eating — and the last crop you can dig in spring.
Cold storage · FreezingPick, store, put up →
Very hardyLeafy greensPicked Apr–NovSpinach
The hardiest green there is: sown in September, picked in April, and the first thing in the freezer in June.
FreezingPick, store, put up →
Writing your field guide — reading the forecast, the moon and the map…
In the garden now · October
Who else is working the garden
The insects and soil life out near Mbabane, Eswatini in October. Most of them are on your side — learn the few that aren't before you reach for anything.
PollinatorSep–AprHoney bee
Apis mellifera
Golden-brown, banded, furry thorax, and pollen packed onto the hind legs in visible baskets.
What it does in the garden →
PollinatorOct–MarHoverfly
Syrphidae
Wasp-striped but a true fly: two wings not four, huge eyes, and it hovers dead still in mid-air.
What it does in the garden →Photo: Anne Parker · CC BY 4.0
BeneficialOct–AprLady beetle
Coccinellidae
The adult everyone knows; the larva is the useful one — a spiky, alligator-shaped grey-and-orange creature that looks like a pest.
What it does in the garden →
BeneficialOct–AprGround beetle
Carabidae
Shiny black or bronze, fast-running, with grooved wing covers and long legs.
What it does in the garden →Photo: Gavin Slater · CC BY 4.0
Soil lifeMar–May, Sep–DecEarthworm
Lumbricus terrestris
Familiar; look for the saddle-like clitellum a third of the way down a mature worm.
What it does in the garden →Photo: José Garrido · CC BY 4.0
PestOct–MarAphids
Aphidoidea
Tiny pear-shaped insects, green, black or pink, with two little tailpipes at the rear. Sticky honeydew and ants tending them are the giveaway.
What it does in the garden →Photo: Eddie Dunbar · CC BY-SA 4.0
Also out there this month
Photographs are research-grade observations from iNaturalist, each credited to its photographer. Ranges and timing are typical, not guaranteed — 87 species are covered across North America, Europe and Africa.
Behind this week's gardening
The day, the ground and the sky over Mbabane
Slugs work all day, not just at night, and blight moves in wet warm air.
- Ground beetlebest now — Running the soil surface after dark, taking slugs, cutworms and larvae. One of the best predators a garden has.
- Earthwormbest now — At the surface after dark and in wet weather, pulling leaves down into the burrow.
Overhead · Mbabane, Eswatini
The sky over the garden
The two clocks nothing on the ground can argue with: the length of the day, and the phase of the moon.
The sun
12h 28m of light
Sunrise
05:29
Solar noon
11:43
Sunset
17:57
A month from now the day will be 0h 44m longer. Enough light for steady growth.
The moon
Waning Crescent
15% lit · waning · day 26 of 29.5
- Next full
- Oct 26 · 20d
- Hunter's Moon
- Next new
- Oct 10 · 4d
- Darkest nights
Planting by the moon: Last quarter to new: a resting phase — weed, prune, harvest, turn compost and prepare beds.
Anglers' solunar rating: good — the tradition says fish feed hardest in the days either side of new and full, and around moonrise and moonset. The evidence is mixed; light and weather matter more.
Turn of the season
Summer solstice
Dec 21 · 76 days away
About 251 days to the average first frost (Jun 15).
Next moons
- New MoonOct 10
- First QuarterOct 18
- Full Moon · Hunter's MoonOct 26
- Last QuarterNov 1
Right now · Mbabane, Eswatini
Forces at work
Nothing here is a guess. Each of these is read from this week's forecast and this location's climate record, and each one is pushing the season one way or the other.
- Quiet right now
Frost
295 frost-free days
Typically Aug 24 to Jun 15 here. Coldest night in the next week: 12.2 °C.
The hard edge of the growing season. Ice inside a leaf ruptures its cells — one night ends a tomato and sweetens a parsnip.
- Working for you
Soil warmth
16.0 °C
Good for brassicas, beets, chard, carrots and potatoes. Wait on the heat crops.
Seeds read soil temperature, not the calendar. Six centimetres down is where the decision gets made.
- Working for you
Day length
12h 28m
Gaining about 2 minutes of daylight a day. Every extra minute is growth you don't have to pay for.
The one thing weather can't change. Plants count photoperiod to decide when to bolt, bulb, flower and go dormant.
- Working for you
Heat units
66 GDD / 7 days
Steady heat. Tomatoes set fruit, corn stretches, and pest generations turn over on schedule.
Growing degree days: the running total of warmth above 10 °C. Crops and insects both run on this clock rather than on dates.
- Worth watching
Rain
6.2 mm / 7 days
6.2 mm across 2 days — short of the ~25 mm a week most beds want. Top up the thirstiest rows.
Sets the pace for everything: germination, fungal fruiting, slug nights, and how a river runs for the next three days.
- Working for you
Pollination
6 of 7 flying days
6 good flying days ahead. Open flowers will get worked — leave a shallow water dish out and hold off on any spray until dusk.
A third of what you eat needs an insect to have visited first. Bees fly on temperature and wind, not on your schedule.
Read and watch with your kids
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