Top tips for a healthy winter garden
Keeping your garden in tip-top shape over winter is easy if you tackle a few important jobs before the cold hits, writes The Warehouse’s gardening expert Josh Clampitt.
The weather might be turning, but that doesn’t mean your garden has to. Here are some great hacks to help you get the most out of your garden in the cooler months.
Keeping your garden in tiptop shape, full of tasty vegetables and blooming with colour throughout the colder months, is actually easy and affordable.
There are just a few important jobs to keep on top of before winter. Here are six steps to follow:
Plant a splash of colour
Just because winter is coming doesn’t mean your garden has to lose its vibrancy. My favourite hardy plants that keep flowering through the colder seasons are cyclamens, pansies, lobelias, polyanthas, hellebores and ericas. They add a fantastic pink, yellow and purple pop to the garden. They also keep our bees fed and happy through winter.
Planting flower bulbs in autumn is a great option, too, fun to start growing from scratch, and a bit more bang for your buck. This will give you a fresh sea of colour and fragrance in spring.
Harvest all year round
There are plenty of vegetables to sow and grow in the chilly months that will help you save a little on your grocery budget. I love the fast-growing brassica plant family that thrives this time of year, including broccoli, cabbage, cauliflower, and brussels sprouts.
Now is also a great time to plant cold-hardy and frostresistant crops such as peas,
spinach, silver beet and lettuce.
Bank your lemons for next year
If you are in the North Island, now is your last chance to plant a citrus tree. If it is a small tree with fruit, I always say you should remove most of the fruit. Removing the fruit helps the plant focus energy on establishing strong roots before winter.
Letting your citrus tree grow steadily will give you more fruitful harvests and a bigger,
happier tree in the coming years.
Get tidy and stay tidy
I know no-one wants to hear this, but at least it is a bit cooler outside to tackle those outdoor chores. It is a really important time to clean up the garden, rake those leaves and get stuck into the weeding.
Getting on top of these jobs now, and keeping on top of it, will help keep your plants and garden healthy through to spring.
Keep your plants warm and fed
Your plants won’t love the cold, so spreading a layer of mulch or compost around flower beds, vegetables and fruit trees will help keep the soil at a warmer and more consistent temperature. It will also suppress weeds and deliver essential nutrients to your plants. Those autumn leaves you raked up also make for a great mulch.
If frost comes to your town, consider a ‘‘frost cloth’’ to cover and protect more vulnerable plants. It’s also a good idea to move your potted spring and summer plants to a more sheltered area.
Remember, your houseplants feel the cold
With less sunshine coming through the windows, our houseplants will start to lean and stretch towards the light, so rotate them each week to keep them centred and check they can see the sky.
It is best to keep them away from cool draughts, and try grouping them together to raise the humidity around them.
Your houseplants need to make the most of the light they get, so keep them dust-free by wiping the leaves with a damp cloth. When repotting houseplants, it is best to wait until spring, but keep an eye out for any bulging roots, and if your plants need more room, don’t leave it too long to plant them in a bigger pot.
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