Watering Damp down the borders, paths and staging at least once a day during warm weather, but do not spray overhead as water droplets may mark the flowers of plants such as carnations and pelargoniums. Unless the plants are standing on a capillary bench which provides water automatically, most will require watering daily and possibly two or three times a day during hot weather. To determine whether a plant needs water, press the compost lightly with your fingers. Most compost is soft and resilient, but dry compost feels hard and gritty. With a little experience, the water content of a pot can be gauged by lifting it to determine its weight. It is important not to withhold water until plants are actually flagging, but to attend to watering each day. Shading and ventilation Shade plants during warm, sunny weather and give them ample ventilation, especially in the early morning when a delay in opening the side ventilators may cause excessively high temperatures in the greenhouse. Except during unusually cold or windy weather, leave the roof ventilators slightly open throughout the night. Open them on the side away from the wind to avoid damaging draughts. Controlling pests Continue to introduce biological controls if insect pest populations begin to increase. Yellow sticky traps hung inside the greenhouse will give a good indication of the current level of infestation and help you to decide whether the biological control is effective. Sowing and potting Continue to sow late flowering pot plants. Prick out the seedlings when they are large enough to be handled and pot on young plants when necessary. Taking cuttings Take semi-ripe cuttings of hydrangeas for use as pot plants. Choose well ripened, greenish-brown, non flowering shoots of medium thickness; unripe shoots are light green. Insert the cuttings individually into 8 cm (3 in) pots. These later hydrangea cuttings are grown on without pinching out to produce a single head. Similarly, take semi-ripe cuttings of carnations, chrysanthemums, herbs, pelargoniums, rock plants and shrubs. Details for these plants are given in the individual sections in June and July. Cucumbers Cucumbers should be in full production by now; continue to pick the fruits when they are about 30 cm (12 in) long, and remove all the male flowers as soon as they appear. When a mass of white roots appears on the surface of the bed, apply a 5 cm (2 in) top dressing of well rotted manure, fibrous loam or a mixture of the two. Peppers and aubergines Water regularly and give a feed every fortnight. Watch for red spider mite and whitefly. Tomatoes Pick tomatoes daily as they ripen. Twist the stems round the supporting strings, or tie them to the canes, and remove sideshoots regularly from all cordon varieties. feed tomatoes with an appropriate liquid fertiliser every week to ten days. Vines Thin bunches by removing any small, diseased or otherwise imperfect fruitlets, together with any grapes that are obviously causing overcrowding. Continue to water generously, and try to maintain a balance between temperature and atmosphere. If you want a large bunch of well shaped and plump grapes, cut out the smallest fruits from the branches as the grapes start to swell. Use long, pointed scissors. It is usually worth doing this with outdoor grapes.