The good news is that with the shortest day looming, our day length has reached its minimum. The bad news is that the full force of winter does not usually hit until after that date so do not be lulled into a false sense of hope that winter may miss us this year. Be prepared for frosts which are bound to strike even coastal areas soon.

• Continue the autumn/winter clean up around the garden and as you finish each area, lay a cover of organic mulch to suppress weed growth and add humus to the soil. Don’t waste the autumn leaves. These will rot down quickly in damp, dark conditions and form an attractive and reasonably nutritious mulch.
• If you have not yet planted your garlic, do not delay. We remind you again to keep to New Zealand garlic and to avoid the cheap imported crops which can carry virus and will give poor yields.
• Seed potatoes are in the shops now. The usual advice is to chit them, in other words to spread them on a tray and leave for a few weeks in a dark place to encourage the eyes to sprout. Potato enthusiasts in mild areas will be planting their early potatoes now in frost free areas. Compost will give an added blanket of protection from the cold.
• Continue sowing vegetables such as winter spinach, brassicas and winter lettuce. It is better to sow seed into individual pots at this time of the year (egg cartons can be used for this) and to plant out the seedlings as they get a little size.
• Broad beans can still be sown.
• Dig yams now to avoid feeding the slugs. Yams are a member of the oxalis family. Store the harvest in cool, dark conditions.
• Deciduous fruit trees can be pruned from now on.
• Mark is pleased to report that he is still harvesting sweet corn and tomatoes. Those who followed his regular advice to put in late crops earlier in the season may also be enjoying summer and autumn bounty well into winter.

A quote this week from Sir Simon Hornby, a past president of the Royal Horticultural Society:

I hate rose gardens. I never know why people have them – they don’t have weigela gardens or philadelphus gardens.

Kiwifruit can be picked firm at this time and you will speed up the ripening by bringing them indoors. Placing them in a bag with an apple, maybe in the airing cupboard or a similar warm position, speeds things further.

• Owners of glasshouses can be starting winter tomatoes and cucumber from seed or from plants if you can find them. There are special varieties suitable for growing through winter indoors.
• Fruit trees will be starting to make their appearance in garden centres and often sell out quickly. In Taranaki, apples, plums and pears tend to be more successful than peaches, apricots, cherries and nectarines so chose these first if space is limited. If you are buying bare rooted plants, go for the ones with the biggest root systems, not the best tops. It is what happens below the surface that matters most in establishing plants.
• Keen vegetable gardeners will be continuing planting potato crops but only in warm, frost free, sunny positions.
• Make sure house plants are not sitting in saucers of water and that you are only watering them once a week at the most. They are best kept pretty dry during winter.
• It is time for the winter copper spray on deciduous fruit trees. Citrus trees will also benefit from a copper and oil spray, especially if you missed the autumn copper spray. We never spray the feijoas, tamarillos, passion fruit, kiwi fruit and other sub tropical fruits, but if you are filled with a burning desire to spray them, now is the time to do it. Copper and oil is a good clean up spray to combat mildew, scale, brown rot and all manner of nasty ailments that can severely affect your fruit crop. Copper hydroxide is apparently acceptable in organic management but copper oxychloride (bluestone) is not.

The Curious Gardener’s Almanac tells us that the first garden gnomes were introduced to UK gardens in 1847 from Germany and only one of the original 21 still survives. Lampy, as it is known, is insured for one million pounds. While some may think the Germans have a lot to answer for in this regard, others allegedly see them as an oppressed minority whose civil rights have been violated by unscrupulous landlords. In France there is apparently an underground movement, the Front de Liberation des Nains de Jardin, dedicated to de-ridiculizing the figurines by placing them back in their natural environment (aka the woods). They are still banned from the prestigious Chelsea Flower Show.

• You can continue planting broad beans, winter spinach, silver beet and members of the onion family including garlic. Technically elephant garlic is in the leek family, not garlic but you can still plant it in the same way though it is too early for leeks themselves.
• It is the optimum time for raising annuals from seed for planting out in early spring. If you raise them in a seed tray, you will have much greater success than scattering the seed straight onto the garden.
• Herbs will benefit from some attention. Woody herbs such as rosemary and sage can be struck from cutting at this time of the year while perennial herbs such as mint, thyme and marjoram benefit from being dug and divided. Herbs are best in full sun with good drainage but don’t generally need as rich a soil as vegetables. Keep them close to your back door for convenience when cooking. Mint can be rather invasive. If you plant it in pot or planter bag and then bury it in the garden, you can curb its wandering ways.
• We noted last year that it was time to blanch the witloof (chicory) and that we would report back on whether it was worth the effort. It wasn’t. They were still bitter and we won’t be growing them again. This year it is kale that is under trial but the first harvest was not promising. Our first attempts at cooking them were only greeted with enthusiasm by the cat. She completely floored us by devouring the tough vegetable leaf which neither of us would eat.
• Garden centres will be full of new season’s stock and we are lucky in our climate that we can plant all winter, unless you live halfway up the mountain or in a very cold inland spot. It is better to renovate gardens and plant now than in spring or (even worse) summer. It gives a chance for the plants to get established without getting stressed by heat or dry. This is even more important for those people who garden on sand or dry soils on the coast.

Even if you think you are a dedicated gardener, you may blench at one Celia Thaxter, who wrote in 1894

These are most anxious time on account of the slugs. Now every morning when I rise I go at once into the garden at four o’clock and make a business of slaughtering them till half past five, when I stop for breakfast.

Either she had a huge infestation of slugs or she was prone to hyperbole.

If you are lucky enough to have an asparagus bed, it is time to clean it up. Break all the tops down and leave to rot down on top of the soil (under the mulch you are going to lay).

You can lightly fork the surface to counteract compacting and caking of the soil but be careful not to damage the crowns of the asparagus. Asparagus takes a couple of years before it starts to crop and it is a permanent occupant so you do need a bit of space to accommodate it, but heading out to pick fresh asparagus on a near daily basis in spring is a highlight of the vegetable year here.

• It is worth learning how to grow plants from seed. At this time of the year, sowing micro greens in a seed tray will give delicious fresh shoots and leaves in a short space of a few weeks. We use the polystyrene trays that mushrooms used to come in (with lots of holes punched in the base) and fill them with a layer of compost on the bottom, a layer of good garden loam next and a top mulch of bark potting mix. The mulch keeps them clean from surface splashing. If you can’t find polystyrene trays (and we have been hoarding ours for years here), you can get plastic or even old wooden trays. You only need about 15cm of depth to grow seeds and most large pots are far too deep which is why trays are better. Keep seed trays in warm, sunny positions and stay on top of slugs which will beat you to young shoots.
• Dig lilies and divide them if your clumps were looking congested this summer. They can be replanted immediately but will appreciate your efforts digging the soil first to make it friable.
• Continue the autumn clean up round, including digging and dividing clumping perennials (the plants which don’t put up woody stems but grow from many shoots on the surface – sometimes called herbaceous perennials).
• It is planting time for garlic, onions, shallots, spring onions and all their relatives. Garlic and shallots are planted as cloves whereas main crop onions are done from seed. These are all gross feeders and need plenty of compost in good soil and full sun. Use local garlic, not the cheap imported stuff which is poor and can carry viruses.
• Queens Birthday is the traditional time for garden centres to have their roses available. Be in early for the best selection.

We have a most irreverent book entitled Bed Undies and Dutchman’s Trousers (subtitled: Naughty Plants for Every Occasion). I am not sure that readers of this paper are ready for the plant list for the Gay Boys’ Border, but if we tell you it is written by self proclaimed haughtyculturalist, Sacha Langton-Gilks and lists such plants as Cercis canadensis Forest Pansy and Rhododendron Faggeter’s Favourite, you may get the drift. The plant lists for naughty people of either gender, plants to give to people you hate, plants for the Religious Border and plants which betray your common upbringing are equally amusing (to some of us, at least).

The early spring bulbs are pushing through the soil now. Keep an eye on them for slug and snail attack and keep their area weed free. Most bulbs need sun and light to grow well, along with excellent drainage. Check to make sure that neighbouring plants are not shading out the bulbs or you may find that they don’t set flowers and can die out. Be careful if you spray for weeds because they are very vulnerable as they come through the ground.

• You can still get a strawberry bed in but do not delay. If you grew strawberries last year, you can either use runners (the stems which leap to freedom out the side) or if you have one of the modern varieties which doesn’t put out runners, you can divide the crown. Strawberries are best redone entirely every year though you can get away doing it every two years. If you are leaving an established bed for another year, clean it up. Cut off all the old leaves, thin the clumps (limit the number of shoots to each clump), fertilise and mulch.
• Brassicas planted now will be ready in late spring.
• The autumn copper spray on citrus trees is the most important one of the year so if you haven’t done it yet, do not delay. Coastal areas of Taranaki can grow oranges and mandarins well so you don’t have to confine yourself to the ubiquitous lemon tree. We pick oranges twelve months of the year from our trees although the mandarins have a much shorter season.
• The camellias in flower at the moment are almost all early flowering sasanqua types which are more tolerant of sun and wind than many others.
• Readers who open their gardens and have access to the Living Channel on Sky may like to tune in to the repeat series entitled “Open Gardens” at 4.30pm on Sundays. It is a really interesting look at how the British manage their National Garden Scheme (the famed Yellow Book) and how they carry out rigorous garden assessments while keeping most people happy.

The recent edition of the new publication, The Gardener’s Journal, has a wonderfully provocative piece by Christchurch writer, Barbara Lea Taylor. Headed “Free the Grasses”, she starts:

If I see any more grasses trapped in suburbia, I’ll scream…. They should never be plonked … in low maintenance beds because they happen to be fashionable. Even worse, they should never be popped in among flowering plants “to add a bit of contrast”. They will inevitably look out of place, like wild birds tamed and caged.

It is worth subscribing to the journal to read this opinion piece alone.