Cop hold of these gardeners tips designed for the upcoming Cop26 summit on the climate
21.07.2023 - 22:35 / awaytogarden.com
VOICES. VISITS. VARIABILITY. That’s how I can tell it’s March. A few feathered musicians are practicing in the pit the last week here, warming up while they wait for everyone else to show up and get in tune. As if on cue, the Eastern chipmunks—light hibernators—are suddenly fully awake and at their antics, trying to remember where the heck they stashed that last cache of goodies. Hungry! Yes, it’s March: Time to “be up, be doing,” as my mother used to say. Time to get at the garden cleanup—or at least anytime the highly variable (chaotic?) weather permits, that is.In last month’s chores we stifled urges to do things too soon, and March up North where I garden can ask self-control of us, too. It’s an if-and-when kind of month, as in: I’ll do things on this list if and when the snow melts, the ground defrosts, and the muck it leaves behind starts to drain off and dry. If and when. Not before!
Biggest caveat emptor: Be sensible and don’t muck around in too-wet soil or walk unnecessarily on sodden lawns. Love your soil, and protect it.
first cleanup and prep tasksKEEP THE PHRASE “as soon as the ground can be worked” in mind, and when it can, focus your first efforts on spots where must-be-planted-early things will go. Examples: plants that are sold “bare-root,” such as asparagus crowns, or raspberries, strawberries or rhubarb, for instance, and even roses from some suppliers. Onion and shallot seedlings or sets, and seed potatoes tend to show up early, too.
ANOTHER EARLY ROW I’ll prep whenever I can: one for peas or spinach or other things I direct sow soon. Make a priority list. You can double back and make ready for your tomato transplants later, but cool-season crops can’t wait.
DON’T CULTIVATE till soil is beginning to be
Cop hold of these gardeners tips designed for the upcoming Cop26 summit on the climate
The Elizabethan Tower where Vita had her study. Credit: Shutterstock
Part of Tom Massey's
When I started this series of K.I.S.S. gardening advice, I hoped to inspire those who didn’t know where to begin gardening and those who may have lost joy in their gardening pursuits. After all, there are plenty of things to worry about these days, and gardening should not be one of them. Gardening should provide a respite and an escape from our screen technology culture. So let’s take the advice of Willie Nelson’s boy, Lukas, and “Turn off the news and build a garden.”
Yes, there are a lot of chores vying for attention: whether to deadhead the spring bulbs, or edge the beds they’re growing in; divide that overgrown drift of some perennial, or pot up the annuals for a summertime show ahead; mow or mulch and so on. But let’s not get crazy—let’s go area by area through the list:vegetable gardenMAKING NEW BEDS? A nature-inspired method for raised-bed building, using fallen branches and logs, is called hugelkultur—and it’s fascinating, and effective, if you’re expanding your growing area.TUBERS AND SLIPS: Are the white potatoes in the ground? Sweet potatoes can go in this month, too.MY NEW SEED-STARTING TOOL will tell you when to sow what, indoors and out. Also fo
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Ask yourself this: Where do you see your garden from most often, and at what time of year? Where does the magical light happen, and catch your eye? For me, it’s a few places:The best seat in the house is the dining-room table (above), where I often plunk my laptop and heaps of messiness when writing and just generally like to be. (So does Jack the Demon Cat, who adores the west view.)I can see a long way due west from that old Chinese wooden chair, and also pretty far south, with a short east snapshot as well…so those directions, starting at the point of my favorite chair and emanating outward, are the primary axes of my garden. Fr
IT’S DEFINITELY TRANSITION TIME right now here in Zone 5B. Chipmunks are out; red-winged blackbirds have begun to return just as February slipped away. But it can be garden-cleanup season, or still deep winter, or some of both in March. Sticks and stones picked up or raked away—if you can even get outside at all—often are replaced at once with another supply from on high, as if you really needed a do-over. Oh, well.HOARD CARDBOARD AND NEWSPAPER while you wait, to smother areas for new beds, or thwart weeds under fresh mulch in existing ones.WHILE INDOOR CHORES such as seed-sowing commence on schedule regardless of weather, outdoor chores sometimes wait until April. Caveat emptor: Be sensible and don’t muck around in too-wet soil or walk unnecessarily on sodden lawns. Love your soil, and protect it.YOUR PLANT ORDERS should be in the mail, or heading that way. When things arrive, bare-root woody plants will take priority in planting, so think
BY AUGUST, BOTH GARDEN AND GARDENER can be looking a little tired. If only I can muster the stamina, both of us can be in much better shape before long. The primary tactics: watering, of course, and weeding, but I’m also looking to freshen things up visually by re-edging beds whose lines have grown fuzzy, and topping up the mulch. There’s nothing I can do to repair holes in leaves left behind by hailstorms, or other such woes—but I can trick the eye, at least, and make the overall picture a little cleaner and sharper.Yes, I sometimes think that August, not April, is the cruelest month (though T.S. Eliot famously thought otherwise, and spelled it cruellest for good measure). It is typically hazy, hot and humid…but that’s no excuse for stopping: Every weed pulled now is a hundred (a thousand?) you don’t have to deal with later. Don’t let them go to seed. Make a pass through each bed each week, since weeds are not just unsightly but
I’ve said in the past that I think of the August chores list as a form of spot cleaning—a headstart on fall cleanup, one blemish at a time. Thinking of it that way makes it more palatable, frankly: a leg up on work I’d have to do later, anyhow? OK; I can handle that.I can’t fix everything, turning brown leaves green again, or sewing up holes in the Astilboides or brassicas. But I can (and must!) try to trick the eye with some targeted trimming, mulching and edging—and lots of deadheading, of course.(I say “must,” because Garden Conservancy Open Day visitors are coming August 17—do join us!)Besides the visual relief, editing out the worst bits reduces hiding places for pests and disease, so again, it’s worth it. Let’s go:weeding and wateringWEED! Make a pass through e
Spring is coming; you can feel it, even here in Zone 5B where the intermediate witch-hazels were trying to bloom despite single-digit F temperatures that rolled the rhododendron leaves up tight as cigars as January wound down. Brrrr! But oh, the luxury of it: Fiat lux! (Let there be light!) Like this:On the last day of December where I live, the day was only 9 hours 16 minutes 18 seconds long; by January 31, it was 9 hours 57 minutes 20 seconds, and February 28 promises me an embarrassment of light: 11 hours 11 minutes 42 seconds. (Calculate your daylength for any day of any year here.)I’m stifling the urge to start ordering plants before I do some planning—reviewing the 2012 garden in my photo library and any notes, trying to match my purchases to what the garden really needs most–not sho