I'm going to build a fence around my garden to grow vining plants on and also keep my great dane from smushing my plants. He likes to lay in the fresh cool dirt.

Good Morning, Melissia,

I hope you were able to get some sleep.

In a normal January, I'm just finishing up whatever I didn't get finished in the fall. Most years, this includes removing plant debris from the garden and putting it on the compost pile or gathering leaves from the woods and adding them to garden beds or compost piles, Prior to that, I'll have removed finished compost from the piles and added it to the beds. That depletion of finished compost then sends me out gathering lawn and garden debris (or, more likely, stuff from the woodland) to rebuild/restart the compost pile I just used up. At the same time, we'll clean out the two chicken coops and put the straw/manure mixture on the compost pile and put new straw in the coops.

Also in January, I'm checking all my lists of veggies, flowers and herbs I'm planning to grow and making sure I have the seeds I need, as well as a sterile soil-less mix for seedstarting. If there's any seeds I still need, I'm checking the local seed racks for them or ordering online.

I gather my seed-starting flats from the garage, sterilize them with a water-bleach mix and stack them up on my potting bench so they are ready to use when the urge to plant arrives. I make sure I have plantable pots (paper cups with the bottoms cut out), flats, a working garden marker to use when making labels for seedings (I buy non-fading garden markers on-line from Harris Seeds), and planting labels (slats from an old mini-blind that I've cut down to the appropriate size).

I gather my gardening gear....usually having to search the house and outbuilding for gardening gloves. Usually I find a pair of gloves in the garage/barn, another one in a bucket of tools on the patio, and maybe one more pair in the laundry room on a shelf. I make sure my mud boots are clean and good-to-go. Since I have worn them a lot in the snow recently, I know they're in good shape for spring of 2010.

I watch the cottage border for young emerging self-sown seedlings of hollyhocks, malva sylvestris, larkspur, poppies and the like. If they are coming up very thickly, I go out with a trowel and thin them out while they are still very tiny. If I don't transplant poppies while they are very young, I'll just have to pull and yank the crowded ones later because they don't transplant well once they are larger. If I don't see a lot of seedlings popping up in January, I scatter more poppy and larkspur seed on the soil surface to fill in the bare areas.

If I'm wanting to start flower seeds to fill gaps in the border, I'll winter sow them, especially if I have seeds that need cold scarification to help them break dormancy. This year, I'm winter sowing some purple coneflowers and kiss-me-over-the-garden gate, though I haven't done it yet.

If I haven't already obtained seed potatoes, I buy them and put them in the tornado shelter which doubles as a root cellar for us. Later in the month I spread out my seed potatoes on a tabletop or shelf to start green-sprouting them as potato planting time approaches.

I check my gardening supplies to make sure I have what I will need. I try to make sure I have Slug-Go or Slug-Go Plus to spread on the beds once young seedlings are transplanted or emerging from the soil. Otherwise the 8 billion pill bugs and sow bugs that hide under my mulch will eat every green plant that is sprouting and growing.

I make sure I have Captain Jack's Dead Bug Brew(spinosad), sulphur, compost tea concentrate, liquid seaweed concentrate, liquid fish emulsion concentrate, neem oil and insectidal soap so I'm ready for the pest season. I always make sure I have a spinosad-based organic fire ant killer to treat fire ant mounds as needed. I check my supplies and make sure I have liquid copper fungicide, I like to gather all these supplies before I need them and have them handy so that when I need to use one, I don't have to make a special trip to get it.

I check all the light bulbs on my seed-starting shelf and replace any that are weak or have burned out. I buy replacement bulbs by the case since it takes 20 fluorescent tubes to fully light my large plant shelf.

In January, or in February if I don't get to it in January, I check all the wooden garden stakes I use to stake tomato cages. I throw away any that are rotten or broken, and buy a new box or two of 36" wooden stakes at Lowe's or Home Depot if I know I'll need more than I have. I check my garden tool bucket to see how many zip-ties I have. I use zip-ties to attach tomato cages to stakes, so I use a lot of them every year. If I am low, I'll pick up a package of them the next time I'm in the store.

I check the wheels on my wheelbarrow, garden cart and little red wagon and fix any that are flat or low.

If I want to plant any bare-root trees or plants, I watch for them to arrive in stores in January and buy/plant them as soon as they arrive so they have more time to establish roots.

If rain isn't falling, I'll water the flower/shrub beds. January is our driest month here in Love County. I think we usually average an inch or two and not much more than that. We had good moisture in December, so I haven't watered any yet this year except for the plants I'm overwintering in pots in the garage (at night) and on the patio (during the day).

I check all my gardening tools and do any necessary maintenance to them now so they'll be ready when needed.

I start making lists of when to start seeds indoors. I probably don't need lists, but I like to write it down on paper so I don't forget anything. I start many seeds on Super Bowl Sunday, and making a list of what to plant when helps ensure I don't forget something.

I don't necessarily draw up a planting diagram, but I try to establish in my mind just what will go into each area of the garden. I used to use graph paper and carefully draw scale drawings of each bed and label what would go where, but I don't do those drawings any more. I've been here long enough that I just do in it my head.

This January, I'm breaking up soil and building more beds so I can grow more veggies, herbs and flowers. I hope to essentially double the size of the garden, but it will be in scattered areas and not in one big area. Our land is basically a hollow adjacent to a creek and most of our land slopes downhill, so I'm putting the new beds here and there wherever I have relatively flat land. I hope to get all the ground broken in January and the new fences up in February.

OTHER MISCELLANEOUS GARDEN CHORES FOR JANUARY:

I argue with myself (in my head, not out loud) about whether I should plant "this" or "that" a little early. Sometimes I win those arguments with myself and sometimes I lose them. I haven't started a single seed, so I guess I'm winning the "don't start too early" battle, at least so far.

I consolidate home-canned goods as the shelves begin to thin out. I've moved all the canned goods left onto one set of shelves and now I can use the other set of shelves to spread out seed potatoes to sprout. I look longingly at the now-empty jars that are piling up in rubber totes in one corner of the tornado shelter and wonder how long it will be before I'm able to drag out the canning supplies and make jam or jelly, pickles or salsa.

I stop and look at every seed rack in every store I go into, generally not because I 'need' seed but just because I want to see if they have anything that I want or suddenly have decided I "must" have.

I start anxiously counting packages of frozen veggies from the garden and wondering if I am going to run out of beans or broccoli or okra or corn before the next crop is ready to eat.

I walk the pastures once or twice a week to see if grasshoppers are hatching yet. I use the size of the January or February hatch to get an idea of what sort of grasshopper problems I'll have this year. If I am seeing a big early hatch, I either order Nolo Bait or Semaspore, or at least make plans to pick it up the next time I'm in Fort Worth. Since these grasshopper baits have a limited shelf life I wait until it is almost time to put them out before I buy them.

In a way, January is a quiet month, but in another way, it is a busy month although it is busy more in terms of preparing for spring while not actually doing a lot of chores that have to be done by a certain time.

In February, I really get busy in the garden.

I've linked the OSU factsheet that includes a monthly 'to do' calendar. People in northeastern OK can find similar monthly calendars on the Tulsa Master Gardeners website.

Dawn

Here is a link that might be useful: OSU Monthly Calendar

Wow, Dawn, you are so much more orgainized than I am. But I do plan on doing many of the things that you do plus if I get a warmish day I will be pulling the darn winter annual weeds out of the perrenial beds. I did have one or two days in Dec to do it, but none since. The chickweed is the worst I've ever seen and dead nettle and henbit not too far behind. Since the ice storm a year ago let so much light into my beds, I'm seeing a lot more of those things.

I also still have some cleaning up to do in the garden. The winter killed fall crops that I left to see how much cold they could take need to come out. I learned the Collards and Brussels Sprouts can take more cold than Chinese Cabbage, Turnips and Mustard. I'm not too sure how much though because the deer jumped the fence and ate the tops off the first two.

And Jan is when I go through all my cupboards and storage cabinets and throw out stuff I don't need. I keep each year's garden catalogs until the next one arrives and sometimes longer, if a new one doesn't arrive. Now that I order so much online, I should probably not get so many catalogs.

I am an oil painter, so I spend time painting in the winter and try not to think too much about gardening until mid Feb when I have to start the peas and broc for the garden.

But the clipping garden I started on my plant bench Jan 3 is up and I am looking forward to adding lettuce, spinach and mustard to winter salads. And gosh, Dawn, I am so Jealous of your seed starting shelves. I have only two benches 2x5ft, one warm and one cool and have been wanting more space for ages. When Dh retires, I am going to ask him to build an extension (upwards) to the warm bench, oh heck, to both benches.

And on DH's day off, we cut firewood a year in advance of needing to burn it. Don't need any this year but still have lots of limbs from last year's ice storm that need to be cut up.

Dorothy,

Ironically, it the is bad winter fire seasons we've had 4 of the last 6 years that forced me to become more organized. I have to get ready for planting early because often the winter wildfires are increasing in number as planting season approaches, and I struggle to find any gardening time in those bad years. I'm hoping for 2010 to be strictly a gardening year and so far it is.

I have oodles of winter weeds in the lawn and they can stay there for all I care. The rabbits will eat whatever they want of the green stuff. In the garden, I do have a minimal amount of sprouting winter weeds in the pathways, but they're in mulch and should be easy to pull out.

We had henbit sprouting in mid-autumn and it was so tall it was blooming. Tim mowed it and then the snow started falling so it is still there, but just barely clinging to life after being frozen.

Those darned deer! They drive me nuts too. We have a pair of yearling fawns that have grown up on our place and I haven't seen them out back eating deer corn lately, but they are hanging out around the garden fence a bit and I'm hoping its' 7' height keeps them out. If it doesn't, we'll raise it to 8'.

I don't want to even think about storage cabinets and cupboards (and closets) but I need to go through them, throw out some stuff, and clean up the rest.

Aren't you going to have fun when DH retires? Keep working on that list of everything you want and need. I know that Tim's dad drove Tim's mom insane when he retired....he needed to have a list of 'projects' to be busy with all the time. If he didn't have that list, he'd do things all on his own....like taking everything out of the kitchen cabinets and rearranging it to suit him. THAT project was not well-received since my MIL did all the cooking and couldn't find anything. So, better for you to have a nice long list of honey-do items for Glenn so he can stay happily busy after he retires.

At least your clipping garden is up and growing so you have something green to look at, and soon you'll be able to clip and eat from those plants.

Cutting firewood a year in advance...now that is really good planning. When we cut up downed trees or limbs, we cut and stack it and save it for a neighbor who has a fireplace. He doesn't use the fireplace much, but when a big chill is expected, he calls and says "got any wood?" and of course, we always have some someplace.

Dawn

Yall are SO organized - I'll admit that all my old veggies are still in my garden from last year's garden - so I still have that on my "to do" list. . .

Thanks for posting though, it gives me LOTS to think about doing.

I have a bit of a sore throat today - that's why I couldn't sleep. . .hopefully it passes soon.

Melissia

Dawn, your link isn't working for me. I tried it 3 or 4 times and it locked up my browser every time. Might just be some weirdness on my end so who knows?

January chores for me are:

1. Clean & organize the greenhouse.

2. Figure out a basic plan and make a growlist.

3. Nag hubby to do whatever (build raised beds, put up fencing so the goats can get out of the garden area by planting time, etc).

4. Finish up any lingering projects so I can spend February completely devoted to seed starting and planting!

Diane

Dh's sister said her husband didn't want a "honey-do" list when he retired. Made him feel henpecked, I guess. But my DH, I am glad to say, loves for me to make lists, with numbers, so he'll know what I think is most important. He doesn't always follow it exactly, but likes to look at it anyway.

I let the winter weeds go in the lawn too, and that's how they got started in my perrenial beds. The lawn mower blew the seeds in there last spring, and there wasn't enough mulch to prevent them coming up. So after I weed, I need to spread more mulch.

But now to bed. Dorothy

I finish (start to finish) garden clean up. I also try to plant my parsnips about now. The seed just sits there until conditions are right. This is also when I usually switch into high gear on harvesting and using parsnips and Jerusalem Artichokes (Sunghokes). This winter conditions have been adverse for digging, due to all the cold and moisture. I actually went out, with a mattock (the the amazement of my wife and daughters) last Saturday, and tried to dig some sunchokes. Well, I got it "out of my system," but only brought in two :) The ground was really hard!

With any break in the weather I like to work up garden soil, weeding and pulvarizing the clods. I use hand tools, almost exclusively. So this takes time.

This year, also, I'm running behind due to so much change in our lives (job change, etc.) On top of that, we've been butchering down our flocks, to the leanest we can get them before spring births/hatches. Jerreth is canning a lot of meat, which takes quite a bit of time. But it's great, and doesn't require freezing, etc. We've also been putting more bee hive equipment together, in order to expand our hives to 5.

George
Tahlequah, OK

Melissia,

I left all my dead flowers standing for the birds because they'll eat the seeds all winter long, so I still have a lot to take out of that part of the garden too. I'm just waiting for a perfect, pretty day to do it....not a cold, misty rainy one like is forecast for today. Next week's weather looks like it will be warm and dry, so I'll likely get out there and yank out all the dead flowers. I looked at the flowers yesterday, and the birds have pretty much stripped them of seeds.

Hope the sore throat improves quickly.

Diane, I just clicked on the link to check it and it worked for me. I'm sorry it didn't work for you. You can get the landscape maintenance calendar by googling Oklahoma Cooperative Extension Service HLA-6408 if you want to see the maintenance calendar.

Dorothy, I'm glad Glenn looks at your list, even if he doesn't follow it exactly. Tim keeps his own list and his priorities are different from mine. His list usually has a lot of volunteer fire dept. stuff listed at the top whereas mine does not. Eventually he works his way through his list and starts helping me with the stuff on my list.

George, I mostly use hand tools too, although we have two tillers. I can't use the big rototiller that Tim uses to break the clay for the first time because it bounces off the hard clay and drags me along behind it. Apparently I lack the upper body strength to hold it still enough that it will "bite" into the surface of the soil and break up the ground.

I do use my little mini-tiller, which is more of a cultivator, sometimes when I'm adding amendments to a bed. I'd just as soon do that work by hand if I have time.

At our end of the state, next week looks to be perfect for working in the garden with high temperatures in the 60s. After all the cold weather and snow, I'm ready for "sunny and 60".

Dawn

So far in January, I have religiously looked out toward the garden every morning when I go out for the paper and noted the amount of snow cover still on it. My confidence is renewed that the garden is still there and I should not have to be concerned about it for at least another day. Sometime in mid February just before the onion sets arrive about the 15th or so, I will rototill, fertilize and hill up the onion rows. That is of course, if it ever gets dry enough to get into with the tractor.

Bob

You are all way ahead of me. First of all, I don't do much veggie gardening, but plant the odd tomato plants and hot as well as mild pepper plants here and there in the flower beds. Even the front yard had green bean plants last year. Strawberries are ground cover in a couple of areas as well. :)

I don't do much clean up, till just about a week or more before planting. Those flower stalks keep the leaf cover/mulch from blowing away.

Most of my snow is gone, with just a little bit where the piles were the tallest.

I usually dig out lots of bermuda grass in the winter, but so far, with all the snow and cold that hasn't been done. Maybe my flower areas won't grow much this year?

I must be lucky, or I pulled the henbit out at the right time. Not much showing in my yard at this time. Yeah!

It's very foggy out this morning. I can hardly see the fence between me and my neighbor.

Moni

PS, Dawn, the link worked for me.

Moni,

Thanks for checking the link. I was afraid it was only working for me.

Diane's computer must have been misbehaving yesterday.

I don't mind the henbit out here in the country. The little purple flowers brighten up the countryside when they start blooming in February. If I lived in town where people expected lawns to look a certain way, I might not be as happy to see the henbit in the lawn. I do hate it in beds though because it outgrows everything else and reseeds so freely.

I'm not surprised y'all still have a little snow on the ground there. We have been in the upper 50s this week and there are still a few random piles of snow in areas with shade, like fencelines with tall grasses and such. Our snow usually falls here one day and melts the next so to have any left on the ground three weeks after it fell is amazing.

I don't know about your ground, but assume it must be a lot wetter than mine since y'all had more than twice as much snow as we had. Our ground is still way too wet to work, and rain is in today's forecast. I hate to hope for rain to not fall, but if tonight's rain misses us, I'll be happy because I think the ground might then be dry enough to work next week.

Y'all have more fog than we do. Ours is not very dense and lifted pretty early.

Dawn

Diane, try right-clicking on the link Dawn provided and then when the box comes up, choose "open in new tab". Sometimes your pop-up blocker will interfere with the opening of something on the same tab. I have that happen on lots of websites.

Our ground is really wet, now that most of the snow has melted, so I've been scattering some seed, doing a little wintersowing, too. Just planted my broccoli seed in little peat pots last night for starting under light. It'll be time to go into high gear before we know it, but I do have a lot of cleanup yet to do.

That's strange. The link is still doing it -- completely shuts down my browser. Doesn't matter whether I left- or right-click. Other OSU links are working fine for me, though.

No matter as I can get to it some other way. It's just yet another one of those technology doohickeys I'll never understand.

Diane

Maybe it is computer voo-doo.