HOW TO PREPARE FOR NEXT YEAR’S GARDEN

HOW TO PREPARE FOR NEXT YEAR’S GARDEN

• Take Notes: If you haven’t taken any notes about your garden through out the year , take a moment and reflect back in the spring through summer and write down what worked this year and what didn’t work this year. Remember to take notes on the weather conditions for example, we had a late spring accompanied with a mild summer and a warm fall that extended the tomato harvest.
• Take stock and clean: December is a great time to head to the gardening shed, and or greenhouse to start the process of reconciling your supplies and taking notes on what tools needs to be clean, what needs to be repaired, and or what needs to be replaced. Take inventory on everything, from seed trays, to plant tags, fertilizers, and soil amendments such as sunflower meal, fish meal, or sphagnum peat moss. Give everything a deep clean, including sterilizing the seedling trays. Use a wire brush to remove mud from metal tools, and rub them with an oily cloth to prevent rust. Clean blades of cutting tools, such as secateurs and loppers with a wire wool and sharpen them. Replace any blades that are damaged. I’d like to sterilize my pruners with rubbing alcohol before sharpening them.
• Plan the Garden: Before jumping in and planing the garden plots, break into the seed boxes and take an inventory on what seeds you have and clean out the empty seed packets. Then inspect the seed packets and take a note on the quantities and organize whats remaining by the season or by the alphabet. Pull out your gardening notes from last year and review what worked this year and what didn’t. A garden map for the four season is really helpful. The map helps you keep tract on crop rotating in the garden to ensure the soil health. Now your ready to design your garden plot.
• Order Seeds And Supplies: Have you heard of the phrase, “The early bird gets the worm”? I highly advise that you order early before the suppliers run out of stock. The seed and supply catalogs will be trickling in weekly and it’s easily to get swept up in the excitement. Heck it’s like going the the candy store with a display of thousands of sweet savory treats and you can only have one or two. It’s easily to over order. When ordering keep in mind of your time and space limitations to help prevent over ordering, overspending, and feeling overwhelmed.

You’ve created your garden plot map for next year harvest, and you placed the order on seed’s and supplies, now you ready to go! Sit back and relax and enjoy the holidays to come.

Check out the Monthly Garden Chores for sowing and planting dates.