Now is the time to go through plantings of Helleborus orientalis (winter roses) and cut off the tatty and tired old foliage.

That way you will get the full effect of the fresh flowers in winter. Otherwise they tend to be hidden under the old leaves. Thin out seedlings too, to prevent future congestion. The leaves can be left to lie on the garden beds and putting on a layer of mulch will tidy the appearance as well as smother fresh weeds and seeds which will germinate throught the winter. Auckland hellebore expert, Terry Hatch, is alleged to run his lawnmower through his hellebore patches but you need to get your timing spot on for this.

• Divide clumps of polyanthus and they will romp away when they have more space and freshly dug soil. Polyanthus are very rewarding in a low key sort of way, with flowers for many months. Lovers of English primroses will find that they are nowhere near as rewarding in coastal Taranaki as in cold, inland areas. They can put on too much foliage and too few flowers in warmer climates.
• Continue the autumn clean up in both the ornamental and vegetable gardens.
• Garlic can be planted from any time now onwards until mid winter. Shun imported garlic totally. Potentially it harbours viruses which could destroy our local garlic crops and because it is from the northern hemisphere, it is out of its natural seasonal cycle so yields will be very poor in quantity and quality.
• If you feel you must spray your lawns (though we are hoping that the perfect green sward achievable only by the frequent and heavy use of chemical sprays is on track to become as unacceptable as SUVs), get onto them now. It is safer to use hormone sprays now than in spring when they can wreak havoc on neighbouring plants in full growth. Sulphate of ammonia can also be used to suppress broad leafed weeds.
• If you have not harvested all your potatoes, do not delay any longer because disease and insects will attack the tubers.

From the real estate pages, we are delighted by the description of a property with good shelterbelting. We feel shelterbelting or beltingshelter may become the latest rage for rural dwellers. Could save on petrol driving to the gym.

Just last week we were talking about autumn and continuing mild temperatures. We were a bit taken aback by the sudden descent into winter temperatures (forget three dog nights, it has been two full on fires here each night).

While temperatures should rally somewhat, it is timely to remind gardeners not to delay on battening down for winter. If you grow frost tender material, be prepared for an early frost. It only takes one unexpected frost to do a large amount of damage.

• Cold weather saps the motivation of all but the most determined gardener, so grab any mild days to progress the autumn clean up round. Only inland gardeners in cold conditions will put their gardens to bed for winter. The rest of us have year round growth to some extent but a clean up round does make the place look much more loved. Mark hostas or other deciduous perennials now that you plan to divide when dormant. It makes finding them a great deal easier when they have gone underground.
• Leaf drop will happen quickly now that temperatures have dropped so markedly. Obviously paths, driveways and sealed areas need to be kept clear of fallen leaves or they can become slippery (we still love our blower vac for this task but if you lack one of these, leaf rakes are much easier to use than garden rakes). Autumn leaves should be seen as part of nature’s bounty, not a nuisance or, horrors, something to be burned. Raked into a moist heap, they rot down really quickly to give wonderful leaf mulch.
• It is definitely time to get broad beans sown. These are a real treat when harvested fresh and young.
• As you complete autumn harvest of pumpkins, corn, potatoes, tomatoes etc, clear the beds and sow down green crops. Lupin is ideal at this time of the year and has wonderful nitrogen fixing properties.
• Make weeding and mulching a priority. Reducing the weeds at this time of the year will greatly reduce their impact in spring and summer coming.
• Pick up walnuts for drying. You need to beat the rats to them. If you are promising yourself to buy a walnut tree, look for grafted ones. Seedling grown walnuts are extremely unreliable and you may waste many years only to find that yours will never fruit properly.

Two hundred years ago, Samuel Butler wrote:

Youth is like spring, an over-praised season more remarkable for biting winds than genial breezes. Autumn is the mellower season, and what we lose in flowers we more than gain in fruits.

Were he from Taranaki, this could be interpreted as advice not to forget to pick up your feijoas.

The heavy rain this week almost certainly heralded the end of our protracted Indian summer and the quick transition to full scale autumn. The drought is highly unlikely to return now. So while we may moan about the showers and greyness (are some of us never satisfied?) it does mean you can get back into the garden with a vengeance and start planting, dividing and moving.

• Keep an eye on your favourite garden centres. They will be taking delivery of new season’s stock now and it pays to get in early because it is not always possible for them to re-order.
• It is autumn clean up time in the ornamental garden, particularly with perennials. You may like to take note of what feeds the birds before you get too carried away with cutting back. Perennials really need to be lifted and divided every few years (few meaning three to four years) and if you can’t see yourself getting around to it, you can excavate some of the congested clump out as you cut back the top foliage. Top dress with some compost to keep things tidy and to add goodness to the soil.
• Make the final cut to large plants you are wrenching in preparation for relocation and plan to get them moved over the next three weeks or so to give them time to re-establish roots before the cold and wet of winter strikes. For the same reason, early autumn is the best planting time for all trees and shrubs, especially in areas which are prone to dry summers.
• Now is a suitable time for pruning and shaping most evergreen shrubs and trees but if you are giving them a haircut, you will be taking off the flower buds. Think of shaping now and haircutting later (after flowering). Shaping uses saws (a chainsaw even), loppers and secateurs. Haircutting uses hedge clippers.
• Planting in the vegetable garden at this time is geared up for harvest in spring. If you are keen, you plant garlic and onions in May but prepare the ground now to give it time to settle. They grow better in ground which is a little more compacted than freshly dug fluff. Beds are often better raised a little for winter crops. Autumn is the traditional time for composting all gardens, especially the vegetable garden. If you are continually harvesting from the same area of garden, you have to keep adding humus to the soil or it will become poor and depleted. Synthetic fertilisers are a poor substitute for green crops and good compost. They add short term nutrients but not humus.
• With the wet weather, keeping a copper spray on the tomatoes is even more important to extend the season if they have not already succumbed to blight.

If you have a surplus of cucumbers, The Curious Gardeners Almanac says that they were much cherished by the Ancient Egyptians who made a drink by cutting a hole in one end and stirring up the flesh with a stick. To us this just indicates a diet which is sadly lacking in greater delights such as fresh coconut, pineapple or even orange juice.

Rain glorious rain last Sunday and Monday was a welcome relief for gardeners as well as farmers.

While we have not yet had enough to bring moisture levels back to normal, it does at least herald the start of the new gardening cycle. It should be safe to sow lawns. You can be starting to divide perennials and clumping plants (but make sure you water them in well) and thinking about autumn planting of shrubs and trees.

• If you are planning to divide or plant bluebells, do not delay. They will be moving soon. Our large daffodils are already in growth but the dwarf daffs are still able to be divided and moved.
• If you have untidy looking hedges, now is the time to give them a trim in preparation for winter if you are in a fairly frost free or light frost area. Trimming them encourages fresh growth and you don’t want to delay or that growth will be very soft and tender just when Jack Frost pays his first visit. Leave the radical hair cut for springtime when the plants are in full growth. This is more a light maintenance trim.
• The Curious Gardener’s Almanac quotes an old saying:
  

  if a shrub flowers before the middle of summer, prune it in the autumn; if afterwards, then wait till spring. There are exceptions to this but generally it holds true.

  We are still digesting this piece of advice. Certainly you will be trimming off flower buds on rhododendrons and camellias at least, but it may be appropriate for radical rejuvenation where you are willing to sacrifice the flowering for the next season. So if you are an inveterate hacker, you could take this piece of advice and head out to prune everything (except flowering cherries where you have missed the boat) which flowered before the end of January.

• Keen vegetable gardeners will be preparing the ground in advance for later crops such as onions. Keep tomatoes sprayed with copper to extend their life span into autumn. Citrus trees will also benefit from a clean up copper and oil spray to combat botrytis and scabbing on the fruit. Botrytis will take the leaves off and rot the fruit.

The final thought for this week (also from the above mentioned almanac) is that worms are roughly 1000 times stronger than humans, relative to their size. We did not know that and it is likely that you did not either.

• In the current dry conditions, there is not a lot you can do in the garden. Treat this hiatus as a time for contemplation and planning. In cold climates where gardening is not possible for months on end, winter is the time for planning. Here we can continue to garden all winter, but this abnormal dry spell has put the brakes on most gardening activities this autumn.
• If you are still mowing your lawns, set the lawnmower on a high level. If you scalp your lawn by mowing it too short in these dry conditions, the grass will die and it will be weeds which will be the first to colonise the bare areas.
• Keep preparing areas for new lawns. At least the dry weather makes it easy to hoe off germinating weeds. Wait for the promise of a second rain before you actually sow the lawn.
• If your vegetable garden is well cultivated and well watered, you can be planting winter vegetables such as brassicas, lettuce and even broad beans if you are really keen.
• Dig potatoes. Clear old crops and sow areas you don’t need for replanting in green crops.
• It seems a bad season for whitefly. If you have particularly bad infestations (check your pumpkins and other cucurbits), get rid of the host plant by covering it at the bottom of your compost heap. Whitefly appear to have overcome their natural predators and are now immune to many of the sprays available to the home gardener so early intervention is best, especially in a glasshouse. With a life cycle of five days, the population can explode exponentially in an alarmingly short period if you ignore it. If you feel you must spray, Confidor kills the adult flies and works as long as the plant is not getting reinfested. Applaud attacks the larvae stages but not the mature flies. Flyspray or summer oil with added pyrethrum can also knock them down.

Mark was given The Curious Gardener’s Almanac for Christmas which is proving to be a fund of information. This week’s snippet for readers is the origin of the wheelbarrow – thought to have been developed in China around 1800 years ago as a form of transport for military supplies. There is no evidence that it reached Europe until the thirteenth century. Where would we gardeners be without it today?