Garden guide: January and February (temperate climate)

January:

There is no doubt that we are living in Australia when you consider the changeable weather we have experienced in the last couple of months. As the summer heat continues to increase, be prepared to reduce its punishing effect on your gardens with deep watering and mulching. Otherwise, you may lose some plants and your annuals and summer veggies will be frizzled. Drip irrigation, if adequately installed, can provide a deep watering which sends valuable moisture to the roots and subsoil. I also use ooze hoses around the garden. They are fragile and easily broken, but when they are in working order and tap is not turned on too hard, they send droplets down along their whole length; albeit with the majority dripping from the end which is placed lowest. They can be repaired with 13mm polypipe joiners if needs be. If you only water briefly with a hose or micro spray irrigation, then the bare surface (possibly the top 1mm) only will be wet. I am not a fan of micro spray irrigation.

A good idea is to mulch around summer salad veg seedlings. Keep adding to the soil with manures, fertiliser, compost and organic mulch, so that the soil takes in and holds moisture and feeds your crops well.  Keep up successive plantings of things like lettuce for a good supply. You can also move these around to a better spot if needed. As well as keeping leafy crops moist, fertilising will keep them growing and delay them bolting to seed. A wetting agent, such as Saturaid, used on your container plants and the garden in general, will make watering far more effective, as it helps water penetrate evenly. If you are willing to muck about with a compost heap, keep any lawn clippings aside for making compost, ensuring that you aerate any clippings to prevent them going slimy. After each layer of fruit and veg peelings, add a generous few handfuls of grass. Introduce compost worms, add moisture when it’s dry and ‘Abracadabra!’ You will have worm turned compost eventually.

You may be enjoying summer annuals such as Petunias at the moment. If things get too scorched, plant out some colourful Portulacas which I am sure could tolerate the weather on Mars. They are great in containers & will re grow from seed every year.

Citrus should be kept moist, or when it does rain, the skins will split open. Remember to pick up affected or diseased fruit. The ooze hose is a good thing but be prepared to leave it on for hours to do a good job. Fertilise them each 6 to 8 weeks and mulch well with good organic mulch like sugarcane and/ or dried out lawn clippings. A dressing of cow manure and compost prior to mulching will be beneficial. You will be rewarded with healthy abundant crops of fruit.

February:

Hopefully we will have a mild February this year. Otherwise, don’t bother to plant things now unless you are willing to devote daily attention to them. Choosing tough plants which can handle the climate we live in can make life a lot easier for gardeners. Crepe Myrtles should be looking good now. Think about including them if you have space, as they are one of those good performing tough guys in the plant world. And they have beautiful bark to admire when they lose their leaves in winter. Other examples are Cycads, Yucca Elephantipes (Can you guess what ‘Elephant’ means? Hence best in pots), Gazanias, roses (believe it or not), some succulents, Autumn or Storm Crocus, Dwarf Date palms (Phoenix Robeline: best in areas with plenty of space around them, due to dangerous spines), Oleanders (toxic plants) & Rubber plants (in pots only) among many others. If you want to keep your lawn alive, you may have to water it at this time. Soaker hoses turned down very low can be a good temporary alternative to expensive watering systems, provided you are around to shift them about.

When you mow the lawn, mow up high if it is looking stressed.

If we are blessed with rain, then be prepared for humidity, which brings with it fungal problems. Keep garden areas clean of dead leaves and weeds. Avoid watering foliage of susceptible plants and keep good air circulation around roses.

Prune spent rose blooms, especially for Iceberg varieties. Then in about 6 weeks, you will have another autumn flush of flowers.

If lawns are able to be kept lush and you still actually have a lawn, be on the lookout for lawn grubs from now on through to March. If you suspect them, put a mat or similar down overnight. In the morning they will be sheltering underneath it. Otherwise it may be a fungal problem.

Many lawns fail to thrive because there just isn’t enough good soil depth. You should have at least three quarters of a spade deep of good soil with a base of clay underneath this ideally.

The larger varieties of cherry tomatoes should be going well at the moment. We usually pick more than we can eat, without the pest and disease troubles of larger tomatoes. Organic tomatoes at the supermarkets can be expensive. Otherwise, try the farmer’s markets! These farmers are the real fresh food people, with produce often picked just prior to travelling to the markets. We enjoy a lot of fresher, cheaper, organically grown produce from our markets here in Newcastle.