Broadly speaking
In the vege patch
Broad beans may still be sown in soils that are not too heavy.
Rhubarb may be divided and replanted now. Lift crowns and chop with a sharp spade, ensuring each piece has at least two buds and some roots. Add plenty of manure (fresh is fine for rhubarb) and compost into soil before replanting. Top dress existing rhubarbs with manure or sheep pellets and compost.
After fruiting, cut raspberries’ old fruiting canes to ground level. Take cuttings to extend your raspberry beds.
Try not to walk on soil much if it is wet as it compacts it and can damage its structure.
Turn the compost heap — and if it is not covered, then cover to protect from the winter rains. Corrugated iron, a tarp or sheet of black plastic will do the trick.
Any clear ground may be limed in preparation for spring — about a handful per square metre is adequate.
Spread compost onto asparagus beds now too.
Give leeks a side-dressing of fertiliser.
In the flower garden
Feed daphne with an acid fertiliser (and repeat in spring). If its leaves are looking pallid and yellow, don’t despair, this tends to be common just before flowering.
Cut back old leaves on hellebores to just above ground level. New buds and flowers should be poking through the earth under them. Sprinkle lime around the plants and mulch with horse manure.
Lift and divide overgrown clumps of perennials. Lift bedding begonias and keep under cover (in a shed or garage) over winter for replanting in spring.
Trim hedges lightly, remembering that any subsequent new growth will be susceptible to damage should an early frost strike.
Take hardwood cuttings of shrubs such as buddleia, flowering currant, deutzia, dogwood, forsythia, hydrangea, philadelphus, rose and viburnum; of climbers such as honeysuckle; fruit such as gooseberries, currants, fig and mulberry and many deciduous trees.
Keep on top of weeds — they won’t stop growing until the soil gets really cold.
Plant spring bulbs and corms.
Give your orchard a clean up
On a still, dry day, remove dead or diseased wood and mummified fruit on the tree or the ground.
Then give most trees (except pear and apricots, which can be sensitive to sulphur) a spray of lime sulphur. This helps stop fungal diseases and pests from overwintering. It will burn off any remaining foliage too – so do not apply to evergreens as it will damage foliage.
If brown rot has been a problem on your stone fruit, a spray with copper fungicide in autumn will kill the spores. Repeat in spring, before and after flowering. If brown rot has been a regular problem for you, spraying through until harvest may be necessary (check the withholding period before picking fruit).
Horticultural oil provides a physical barrier against scale, mites and mealy bug.