Things to do in your garden in January
Words and photos by Olivia Thomas
It’s cold, wet, maybe you’re off the booze or clinging to dearly held New Year’s resolutions. Your garden may be the last thing on your mind. But for me January is a shiny month full of promises and new beginnings, and it’s the month to get thinking about your garden.
Planning
So when I told you to pay attention in your outdoor space in the summer, this is what we were working towards. What worked? What didn’t? Does it need to be lower maintenance? Tidier? Looser? More flowers, more greenery? How did you use it - did you realise you really need a dedicated eating area, that you’d love a proper veg patch, that some bits aren’t pulling their weight? Or maybe you loved it all but you’d like to try a few new things this year.
This is where active, thoughtful planning comes in. If you’re planning a bit of an overhaul, take a leaf out of garden designers’ books (leaf? Geddit? Sorry) and make a bubble plan. Draw a rough plan of your garden with any permanent features like flower beds, buildings, etc marked in. Then look at what you’d like the garden to include - an area for entertaining, a bit for children to dig in, somewhere for the chickens - and draw a rough outline round that area marking what you plan for it. This will help you start thinking about what goes where. Ideally, mark the direction of north on your plan, and think about where the sun falls during the day - no point planning your cut flower patch in a dark-north facing corner or in the shade of a big tree, but that might work brilliantly for a kids’ mud kitchen.
Get shopping!
This is my idea of fun. I’m not much into clothes or accessory shopping, but let me loose in a nursery or garden centre and I’m all in. Order seed and plant catalogues, get onto websites, crack open books and do some research on what you’d like before you start buying. As a rule of thumb, it’ll look better to have more of a few things than loads of different things, so start with the foundation of your planting - that’ll often be choosing a few good shrubs that will be in leaf or flower at the time that you want and will grow to the final height that you’d like. Are you after evergreen or structural shrubs to give year-round interest? Something that flowers enthusiastically all summer long? Something to attract wildlife? The RHS Award of Garden Merit is a useful marker of plants that have been proven to be particularly great. Things may not be delivered now, but you’ll need to order in advance to get what you want.
Tidy up
Maybe it’s just chez moi, but by now the garden looks distinctly grubby. Rain and puddles have left mud everywhere, wind has blown debris about, dead stuff looks particularly dead. When a sunny day allows, get out there and spend some time clearing up. There will be some signs of early new growth, and it’ll lift your spirits no end. Cleaning out the greenhouse and washing pots always makes me feel that spring will come in the end.
Tend autumn-planted hardy annuals
If you started any plants in the greenhouse or cold frame, make sure they’re watered as required and not forgotten. Same goes for any cuttings, etc you’ve got overwintering in enclosed spaces.
Have patience
In all but the warmest parts of the UK, this isn’t a month to do much actual sowing and gardening. Don’t get tempted to get started too soon - you’ll just have leggy seedlings that will never do well. Hunker down, grab your seed catalogues, tend your houseplants and watch the days get slowly lighter. Happy planning!