Cringleford Horticultural Society
NEWSLETTER JANUARY - FEBRUARY 2012
At the beginning of 2012 I wish you all a happy and peaceful New Year. I am not using the word 'prosperous' in view of all the predicted economic doom and gloom! As gardeners, we have a resource more precious than that which is measured in financial terms. We grow plants and in our gardens we can absorb the calm and wonder at the miracle of growth and renewal of these living things. So let that be our 'New Year Resolution' to absorb ourselves in our gardens when things get tough. Over a century ago Chartres Dudley Warner had this to say about gardening "To own a bit of land, to scratch it with a hoe, to plant seeds and watch the renewal of life - this is the commonest delight of the race, the most satisfactory thing a man can do"JOBS TO DO IN JAN/FEB.
It was never more true to say that the jobs that can be done in the garden in winter wholly depend on the weather, There are many things to be done, from removing big weeds from the lawn to preparing the ground for flowers or veg-- but whether these can be done in a hard frost or a howling gale is another matter! This letter covers 2 months of winter, so the jobs recommended for late February may not be suitable in early January.Borders and Ornamental Garden.
January is the time to go over your borders and remove weeds and decaying debris from your emerging spring bulbs and from thr crowns of herbaceous perennials. Remove any dead and diaeased leaves and flowers ftom winter pansies and pompom daisies. As we get near the end of Feb, many plants like snowdrops will have finished and if they are overcrowded can be split up and spread out. If you are buying new snowdrops or aconites ‘in the green’ now is the time to plant them, preferably in small clumps, as some of the plants may not survive the root disturbance. On reading the Jan.edition of 'The Garden', I noticed that the Jury is still out over the matter of planting 'in the green' as against planting dormant bulbs when it comes to snowdrops. Have newsletter readers got any ideas about this? I have not grown snowdrops from dormant bulbs, so it would be interesting to hear from any of you who have done so.
Perennials. There is still time , provided that soil conditions are OK, to divide overcrowded herbaceous perennials that have not done so well this year. Dead material can now be cut back, old flower shoots and grasses. A thick mulch could be applied to the tender ones.
Summer bulbs. If you have spaces in the borders, now is a good time to buy and plant summer bulbs such as lilies, Ornithogalum, Galtonias, Tigridias, alliums and Crinums.. If you are short of space, some of these, like lilies look really good in pots.
Summer-flowering bedding plants.
If you grow these from seed, these seeds should be sown in January. If from plugs, these can be ordeted now, with plenty of bargains to be had from the catalogues.
Containers. With what could be severe winter weather to come, check any containers with plants such as camellias. Insulate the pot with bubble plastic or similar, to prevent the root ball from freezing. In Garden Centres, complete 'fleece jackets' can be bought to enclose the whole plant. Hellebores. Check your oriental hellebores and cut off the old leaves and any leaves showing black blotches of fungus infection. Apply a mulch to retain moisture and keep the flowers clean.
Trees and Shrubs.
January and February are the best months for planting new trees and shrubs or moving existing ones. While they are dormant, pruning such as pollarding can be safely carried out. Hedges can be given a final trim before birds start to nest in them.
Seed sowing.
Sweet peas can be sown now if you did not do this in the autumn. Sow 4 or 5 seeds in a large pot or in rootrainers. Some warmth is advisable to germinate, after which the seedlings should be grown cool, in good light. Monty Don in 'Gardener's World' is running a trial to compare sweet peas sown in the autumn and those sown in the spring. I am doing both, so am interested in his results. If you are sowing seeds of any kind at this time of year, do try to give them as much light as possible. Of course the professionals use special 'grolights' in their propagation units, which is why you see large tomato plants in the Garden Centres, when our seedlings have barely got started!
Pruning.
Plants that can be pruned in Jan/Feb include - apples and pears, remove dead growth and branches from the centre of the tree - keeping an open structure.New growth can be shortened by about a third and side shoots trimmed back to 5 or 6 buds.
Hardy evergreen hedges and overgrown deciduous ones.
Late-flowering Clematis like C.viticella can be pruned in February once the buds start to swell. Cut back old stems to a strong pair of buds about 30cm above ground.
Winter-flowering shrubs can be pruned after flowering, like winter jasmine.
Fruit Cage.
As mentioned above, fruit trees like apples and pears can be pruned, including the trained ones. It is still a good time to plant bare-root fruit trees, bushes or canes.Peaches and nectarines should be sprayed with a copper-based fungicide to reduce peach leaf curl.
Raspberries. Prune out all canes on autumn-fruiting varieties, down to ground level. Plants in the wrong place can be removed and new ones put in. As new shoots appear in the spring, it might be worthwhile to take out the thin, wispy ones and retain the healthy, strong ones. Last year I saw quite a number of thin, unproductive canes, which could well deprive the others of nutriment. Taking down the old canes can give you a good supply of 'pea sticks'. Canes not so required are cut into small pieces shredded for mulch or sent-to—the tip - they are too woody for direct composting. My old canes are pruned 'in situ' leaving both hands free. I start chopping at the tip with secateurs and may tackle the bottom part with loppers. The bits can then be swept up and bagged.
Rhubarb. In February the rhubarb crowns of established plants can be covered with special terracotta 'rhubarb forcers'-.posh - but expensive!
I use plastic dustbins, held down with cords or bricks. The results, after a few months, will be succulent, pink stalks - so much sweeter than the thick, tough jobs of the main summer crop. Rhubarb plants are gross feeders remember to give them lots of manure or similar during the season. Strawberries. Tidy up the strawberries, removing all the old leaves and dead bits and any weeds that have crept into the cage when you are not looking! My fruit cage regularly goes from a nice, tidy clean area to an awfully weedy mess, in what seems like a matter of weeks. I grow some strawberries in a 'state-of-the-art' planter- with no success! In our dry E. Anglian climate the plants all dry out unless you water them every day, and to date, I've lost about 4 batches of plants! I am more successful growing them in the ground, using a weed-suppressing fabric.
General. All your fruit trees, bushes and canes will benefit now (Jan/Feb) from a FEED. Sulphate of potash is best - spread over a wide area as the feeding roots are quite a way from the centre of the plant. Some general fertilizer, like Gromore, would not go amiss, especially if your soil is light. Having fed the fruit, then give quite a thick layer of mulch to retain moisture. I prefer leaf mould which does not contain lots of weed seeds.
Kitchen Garden
Potatoes. If you have ordered potatoes, or intend to go along to the Garden Centre to choose yours - when supplies arrive they should be 'chitted' as soon as possible. There is still a debate as to whether chitting actually increases crops, but it does produce spuds with short, healthy sprouts, ready to be planted, and the number of sprouts can be restricted. Mine are chitted on my front enclosed balcony in polystyrene trays used to accommodate young plants brought in from Nottcutts. The spuds, 'rose' side up, fit neatly into these trays and are easy to carry out to the garden. This chitting process applies to spuds grown in open ground or in specially-designed potato bags, for growing on the patio. In my crop rotation scheme, the area for this year's spuds is not a promising one. Partially shaded and with lots of tree roots, the amount of space is limited - so I shall do what I pioneered last year, and grow a large proportion of maincrop spuds in plastic growing bags placed on the surface of the soil in the really poor areas. The bags are filled with fresh multipurpose compost which does not have to be top quality stuff because I add a good amount of organic potato feed.
Early crops.
Sowing some seed under cover in the greenhouse in Feb will give you early crops of veg like baby carrots, courgettes and salad leaves.
Broad beans can also be sown in Feb in individual pots and then planted out in March to give a crop in June and July.
Later in the season(late Feb-March) it is time to grow your tender crops in warmth - seeds like tomatoes, peppers and aubergines. Now my greenhouse is rarely heated, I raise my tomatoes in mini propagators on the window sill. These are small, covered trays, with bottom heat. When large enough, these seedlings can be transferred to a larger heated propatagor in the greenhouse.
Outside.
If the weather is favourable, prepare the ground for your main crops, by digging in as much organic matter as possible - manure and homemade compost. The 'no-dig' principle has been shown to give excellent results but you do need an awful lot of organic matter to spread over your patch, to allow the worms to work it in, or to plant your crop through it.
LAWNS.
Apart from using the trusty old knife or a daisy-grubber, to remove any large, deep-rooted weeds - there is not much to be done to lawns in the winter. It is important not to walk on it if the ground is frozen. However, ground can be prepared where you want to seed a new lawn or lay turf later in the season.Barbara Knowles January 2012