The January Garden Ramble

Back after a short break. Happy New Year, one and all, and may your 2023 garden pursuits be the best ever.

The late-December weather was strange indeed. Out on the East End it went from a mild end of fall right into the depths of winter. Temperatures dropped from the balmy 50s down into the teens while upstate, where I’m hibernating, we went down to -1 degree and didn’t go above freezing for nearly five days. For East Enders and upstaters it was a chance to get the winter mulches down. Keep in mind that the purpose of the winter mulch is to keep things cold and stable, not warm and mushy.

Some places on the East End actually got some snow. Upstate we got 8 inches, which melted in two days followed by 16 inches a few days later. The snowfall gave me a chance to see first-hand the insulating effect of snow. One of the weather stations I am testing is the Ambient WS-5000 to which I’ve attached a soil probe thermometer. During the coldest part of the December freeze when the air temperature was -1 degree, the soil temperature — under 5 to 7 inches of snow — never went below 33 degrees.

Essentially the soil at 3 inches below grade with the snow on top still hasn’t frozen. Even now with the soil temperature at probe location at 42 degrees just 25 feet away where there was no snow cover, the ground remains frozen.

Today our wonderful blue spruce Christmas tree will lose its lights and ornaments. Yes, even my favorite ornament, a pickle, will be packed away until next year. Before trying to move the tree back outside we wrap it with an old sheet, tie twine around the sheet from top to bottom and this keeps any falling needles in the sheet until we get everything outdoors.

Once out on the porch I go to work with my loppers and pruners, removing every bough and branch to be used as mulch. The needles will stay on most of the winter but this mulch isn’t intended to keep things warm or cold. The branches are laid atop plants and rows in the trial garden where it will act as a sun shade late in the winter and into the early spring.

The purpose is to simply keep the sun’s rays from beating down on the soil and young plant crowns so there is little to no freezing and thawing allowing the soil to warm gently in March from warmer air and not the direct effects of the sun. Once the plants show good signs of growth the boughs are removed and pass through the chipper/shredder and onward to the compost pile.

Did the sudden December freeze damage anything? The hellebores still look great, and while I don’t consider them to be evergreen, most of the varieties will remain green through the winter until next year’s leaves emerge and the old ones fall to the ground. Columbine seedlings that germinated in August and September peek through the leaf mulch that went down once the plants were established in late October. Digitalis foliage is a bit trickier, and when the soil and the foliage gets wet they can rot out but so far even these leaves, lightly covered with maple leaves, are looking great.

I have different problems with deer than those of you on the East End. The deer don’t bother my gardens if there’s no snow on the ground. They stay higher up in the mountains. But as the snow gets deeper they descend down the slopes and begin to chew and dig. It’s never a big deal and since I know what plants they love to prune. I simply fence those shrubs and trees. Most of the time it works. The rabbits, on the other hand, tend to get under the fencing and still do some minor damage. I do spray a rotating selection of repellents as well.

Then there are the voles, my nemesis rodent. Their damage often goes unnoticed until the snow melts in the spring, but during the winter when the snow melts down to just an inch or two their pathways under the snow get revealed. This offers great clues about where to set traps. Usually I’ll set two to five traps at a time (wooden mouse traps baited with small pieces of apple and peanut butter).

For the past year though there’s been a dearth of these demons. I think this is due to two factors. The first is a natural drop in the rodent population in general, chipmunks and mice included. The second is the wonderful black cat that lurked around the property most of the summer. He or she was a great mouser and did a wonderful job.

We heat our upstate house with wood for most of the winter. This leaves buckets and buckets of wood ash to get rid of. You may also have ash from your fireplace or wood stove, and this stuff is a wonderful additive to the gardens, trees, shrubs and even the lawn.

Wood ash contains a number of nutrients, the most abundant of which is calcium. There’s also potassium, magnesium, phosphorus and sulfur along with trace amounts of iron, aluminum, manganese, zinc, boron and a few other nutrients. Wood ash is also good for neutralizing soil acidity, which can be a problem out here. Four cups of wood ash has about the same pH changing effect as 1 pound of limestone.

There is a downside though. Never use the ash from fake logs as they contain binders, glues and other products that can hurt some plants. Wood ash will tend to increase the pH of your soil so use it sparingly on slightly acidic soils as necessary.

As a general rule, use 15 to 20 pounds of wood ash per 1,000 square feet of garden or bed per year. That’s about the equivalent of a 5-gallon pail. Make your application when there is no wind, as the ash easily becomes airborne, and don’t apply when the ground is frozen.

If you’ve got a privet hedge that’s in need of major renovations this is the perfect time of the year to do the work. We’re about to get to work on a 100-foot-long hedge that’s about 9 feet tall. It’s way out of control, and we’ll be pruning it back to about 3 feet tall and 3 feet wide. It will take a year or longer to get it back to looking great but privet is very forgiving and obviously somewhat easy to shape.

To avoid future problems with snow potentially crushing the shrub, the top of the hedge should always be narrower than the bottom. If not pruned and maintained this way, snow and ice can cause havoc to all your hard work. Hand pruning can be done once you see where the new growth emerges later in the spring. Hold off on feeding until late spring and then only feed at the drip line.

Feeding the birds this winter? I’ll keep some distance on what to feed and how much, but I do have a few thoughts on where feeders should be. Much of the seed in bird feeds can become weeds in the garden and below the feeder. Keep this in mind with feeder placement. I prefer my feeders to be in the wooded gardens. This allows any excess seed that drops to be easily managed if it germinates, and with an overhang of branches and twigs it makes it more challenging for hawks to swoop down for a feathered meal.

Garden and seed catalogs are arriving but printing issues may slow their arrival. Johnny’s arrived first, and I just can’t say enough about their catalog. What incredible pictures and charts — pages and pages of salad greens and dozens of tomatoes and more. It’s a great learning tool and few other seed vendors have the variety and expertise that you’ll find among these pages. The catalog can be intimidating, and it does take a while to read, but there’s always Burpee’s for the timid. Keep growing.