This Month in the Garden – January

January is traditionally a warm month and holidays are being taken. It is important that the garden survives nicely on its own. Ensure it is weed free and that it is really well watered. Deep watering is essential. To ensure excellent growth apply or top up the mulch. Mulches keep the soil cool and moist as well as providing much needed nutrients.

The Vegetable Patch

·         Sow crops of French beans, turnips, lettuce, radish, silver beet, spinach, kohl rabi, carrots and swedes.

·         Lift early potatoes and use for your summer meals.

·         Mulch runner beans with compost.

·         Plant brussel sprouts, cabbage, broccoli, kale, silver beet and late celery, use lots of compost.

·         Marrows and pumpkins will be sending out flowers. Remember they have male and female flowers.

·         Onions, garlic and shallots should be lifted when the tips go yellow. The bulbs must be dried to ensure good storage for later use.

·         Asparagus. Stop cutting shoots and let them grow so the roots store energy for the next crop.

·         Rhubarb should not be harvested after Christmas. Remove flower spikes and seed heads to encourage good root growth.

·         Outdoor tomatoes. Ensure they are staked and tied to prevent them falling over. Control chewing insects. Remove side shoots (laterals) and any old yellowing leaves at the base. Apply a balanced fertiliser. Keep up a good regular watering cycle that will ensure even growth and ripening of tomatoes. This will also prevent the fruit splitting and the onset of blossom end rot.

·         Courgettes / Zucchinis. Harvest daily to ensure a continuous crop.

Lawns

·         Mow regularly. Remove lawn weeds as they appear or spray with lawn weed killer.

Conservatory and Indoor Plants

·         Begonias. Take care of these tender plants ensuring even temperature, good soil, good drainage, light shade and frequent watering with liquid fertiliser.

·         Ensure all indoor plants are well watered. Provide nutrients by either liquid or pellets.

The Ornamental Garden

·         Summer pruning of a range of flowering shrubs should be done now. Remove the branches and shoots but leave a nice framework for the shrub.

·         Sow seeds for winter annual display. Wallflowers, stock, polyanthus, pansies and violas.

·         Trim hedges.

·         Take cuttings of a variety of shrubs and semi shrubs and place in sharp sand undercover.

·         Mulch the flower garden if there is insufficient mulch on the ground.

·         Remove dead heads from roses. Prune back to the first 5 leaflet leaf. Spray for pest and diseases.

·         Train climbing roses by tying new canes into position and remove canes not required.

·         Remove dead heads from all flowering plants and shrubs.

·         Lift spring flowering bulbs and replant in an appropriate place for next year.

·         Climbers. Ensure these are trained throughout summer. It is easier to do now when the stems are soft and supple rather than when they are hard and woody and likely.

·         Perennials. If required ensure they are staked and tied up.

·         Control thrips and red mite on a variety of plants.

Fruit.

·         Black currants should be picked and prune out very old branches as they fruit on new wood.

·         Red currents should be picked, remember they flower on the old wood.

Glasshouse

·         Tomatoes need to be tied up each week. Remove and side shoots (laterals) and older yellowing bottom leaves.

·         Early ripe fruit will appear, pick it while it is firm.

·         Regular watering is essential for good growth and reduction in Blossom End rot.

·         Capsicums also require lots of water on a regular basis.

·         Control chewing insects on each crop.

December in the Garden

Water the garden well when necessary making sure that the moisture goes well into the soil and makes the subsoil moist. Do not let the soil dry out as this puts the plants under stress and they will not grow well. Containers 9n sunny places will dry out very quickly and regular daily watering is required.

Harvesting fresh vegetables from the garden for both Christmas and New Year celebrations really makes the occasion special.

The Vegetable Patch

• Harvest fresh produce for Christmas
• Mound up peas and/or stake them.
• Ensure runner beans are climbing properly and get a good start on the bean fence.
• Mulch around strawberry plants with straw.
• Sow and plant: Peas, lettuces, cabbages and cauliflowers, French beans, radishes, turnips and carrots for succession planting.
• Cease harvesting rhubarb and asparagus in mid December to build up good rootstock for next year.
• Stake and tie outdoor tomatoes - check for pests and diseases.
• Pick gooseberries and red currents.

The Ornamental Garden

If you grow your own plants from seed now is the time to sow anemone, wall flowers and polyanthus seed and any other plant that takes some time to grow.

• Stoke Delphiniums and other tall growing perennials
• Remove excessive dahlia and chrysanthemum shoots
• Keep garden weed free by hoeing, hand weeding or mulching.
• Remove the dead heads from plants that flower in spring.
• Divide up spring flowering primulas
• Set slug bait near sensitive plants
• Fertilize lawns for good growth
• Annuals will be coming into flower soon, provide some fertilizer and pinch out long shoots to make compact flowering plants.
• Ensure all pot plants are well watered and provided with fertilizer.
• Prune dead heads of roses down to the first 5 segment leaf
• Trim hedges
• Late plantings of summer annuals can be made water well
• Keep Fuchsias well watered
• Prune trees and shrubs to shape by lightly pruning new growth.

The Glasshouse and Conservatory

• Tomatoes should be tied up and lower leaves removed just when they go yellow. 
• Pinch out unwanted lateral growth. Regular and even watering of tomatoes is best for growth, fruit production and ripening.
• Apply a general balanced fertiliser especially a slow release product. 

Fruit

• Apply citrus fertiliser to lemons
• Apply an insecticide spray to combat codlin moth.

Lawns

• Mow the lawn regularly to get an even surface

APRIL IN THE GARDEN

General

April is an excellent time to undertake work in the garden. The days are cooler and there should be a reasonable amount of moisture in the soil. Early planting and replanting of trees shrubs and perennials will enable them to make root growth before the cold winter when root growth is usually dormant.

 Applications of nitrogen based fertilizer should stop now and superphosphate and potash based fertilizers used to ensure good hardy growth to take the plants through the winter.

 Vegetable Garden

·         Plant cabbages, cauliflower, winter lettuce, leeks and silverbeet.

·         Cut asparagus fronds of before seeds drop.

·         Cultivate the vegetable garden.

·         Harvest beetroot and preserve

·         Harvest onions

·         Harvest potatoes and place in cool dark place

·         Harvest Parsley and chop it up in a food processor, place in plastic bag and freeze for easy use

 Fruit

·         Harvest fruit before it is fully ripe and preserve.

·         Fertilise Citrus trees

 Flower Garden

·         Sow early Sweet Peas

·         Plant winter and spring flowering annuals - polyanthus, pansy, wallflower, myosotis.

·         Plant spring flowering bulbs: tulips, daffodils

·         Plant lily bulbs.

·         Lift gladiolus.

·         Prune spent flower heads off perennials.

·         Start lifting and dividing perennials and replanting them in position for next year.

·         Lift and divide rock garden plants

·         Wrench trees and shrubs that you want to transplant around the garden.

·         Plant new trees and shrubs so that their roots can take hold of the ground before winter. Make sure the ground has sufficient moisture in it before you do this.

·         Trim hedges

 Glasshouses

·         Harvest the last of the tomatoes.

·         Remove shade from glasshouses.

·         Cleanup the soil and keep clean ready for next year. If you change the soil now is the time to do it.

 Lawns

·         April is a good time to sow an autumn lawn.

·         Spray lawns for weeds

·         Ensure good moisture content of the soil.

April in the Garden

General

April is an excellent time to undertake work in the garden. The days are cooler and there should be a reasonable amount of moisture in the soil. Early planting and replanting of trees shrubs and perennials will enable them to make root growth before the cold winter.

Applications of nitrogen based fertilizer should stop now and superphosphate and potash based fertilizers used to ensure good hardy growth to take the plants through the winter.

Vegetable Garden

• Plant cabbages, cauliflower and silverbeet.
• Cut down asparagus fronds of before seeds drop.
• Harvest vegetables
• Cultivate the vegetable garden and mulch with compost for the winter
• Prepare garden plots for strawberries and rhubarb

Ornamental Garden

• Plant winter and spring flowering annuals - polyanthus, pansy, wallflower, myosotis.
• Sow: Early Sweet Peas
• Plant spring flowering bulbs tulips, narcissus and snowdrops
• Plant lily bulbs on a bed of sand
• Lift gladiolus and store on cool dry place
• Prune spent flower heads off perennials.
• Start lifting and dividing perennials and replanting them in new positions for next year.
• Lift, divide and replant rock garden plants
• Wrench trees and shrubs that you want to transplant around the garden.
• Plant new trees and shrubs so that their roots can take hold of the ground before winter. Make sure the ground has sufficient moisture in it before you do this.
• Trim hedges

Glasshouses

• Harvest the last of the tomatoes.
• Remove shade from glasshouses.
• Cleanup the soil and keep clean ready for next year. If you change the soil now is the time to do it.

Lawns

• April is a good time to sow an autumn lawn. Ensure good moisture content of the soil.
• Spray lawns for weeds with proprietary chemicals

Fruit

• Harvest fruit before it is fully ripe and preserve.

March Gardening

March is a great month for harvesting fruit and vegetables from the garden. Usually there is surplus produce and we need to find ways to store this for future use. Today freezing is by far the most popular method. It is easy, quick and cost effective in time and expense. Vegetables need to be cleaned and blanched in hot water, cooled, dried off, placed into freezer bags and placed into the freezer. A more time consuming but colourful way of preserving is bottling of fruit and beetroot.

Vegetable Garden

* Sow lettuce, silverbeet, turnips, onions, broad beans parsley, sugar snap peas.
* Water regularly and evenly.
* Sow a green manure cover crop if the ground is not being used – mustard, blue lupin barley or oats.
* Harvest potatoes, onions, garlic, runner beans, dwarf beans
* Plant succession crops of cabbage, cauliflower, broccoli, silver beet, brussel sprouts.
* Protect cauliflower etc from sunburn and early frosts by bending the leaves over the top of the curd.
* Control white butterfly with spray or Derris Dust.

Flower Garden

* Prepare the flower garden for the planting of annual plants for winter and spring displays. Clear out all the summer annuals that have finished, add compost or soil container to the soil and cultivate to a fine filth. Add some slow release fertilizer like Blood and Bone to the soil.
* Now is a good time to take cuttings of most shrubs in the garden.
* Plant out spring flowering bulbs or plan to plant them in April.
* Sow sweet peas in place in the ground.
* Wallflowers and Polyanthus should be planted late in the month.
* Continue to trim shrubs and perennials so that they do not get out of hand.
* This time of year you can prepare shrubs for shifting around the garden. ‘Wrenching’ is the process of cutting some roots by digging part way around the shrub. This forces now fine roots to grow close to the plant so that you can dig up the plant already has a crop of fine roots which will support the plant in it’s new location.

Lawns

* Prepare soil surface for seed sowing.
* Sow lawn seed in late March and keep well watered
* Spray out weeds using proprietary selective lawns sprays
* Top dress hollows with sieved soil to level out lawns. Sow grass seed and keep watered.
* Water regularly.
* Fertilise the lawn to encourage a good sward of grass.

Glasshouse
* Continue looking after all your plants – keep tomatoes healthy.
* At this time of the year harvest as much as possible and freeze to preserve.
* Remove weeds and do not allow insects and diseases to build up or it will be a worse problem next year.

Fruit
* Plant out new strawberry plants.
* Harvest fruit carefully. Do not break the branches when picking fruit.
* Remove all the bad fruit not harvested and dispose of it.
* Fertilise Citrus trees.
* Spray Citrus with Copper based sprays.
* Remove old canes from Raspberries and Boysenberries.