Martha Cantrell, Master Gardener
Hello. First off, I want to thank you for taking such great care of my friends and me, your gardens! We flourished throughout spring, summer, and fall but, now, parts of us need to rest.
That doesn’t mean the pleasure of caring for us stops! While some of you might be like my funny, quirky caregiver who goes into a slight depression this time of year, others of you might wish you lived in a place like Ohio where everything goes dormant and you get to stay indoors drinking hot cocoa. You all might wish this when you are outside in freezing sleet, wrestling with yards of frost cloth flapping wildly in 60-mph winds, in the middle of an incoming Snowmageddon!
We, your gardens, wanted to help you start 2024 right, so we came up with a few New Year’s resolutions that would benefit us both in the coming year and keep caregivers like mine off the ledge. Below are our suggestions:
Nothing is as fun as planting new, beautiful plants in the spring and watching them flourish. The opposite can be said about digging up all the annuals and other deceased flora friends that have gone to the big arboretum in the sky, but it has to be done. If no seeds are included, they can be added to your compost pile. Some gardeners also cut back their perennials at this time, but leave some if you can, providing habitat and seeds for our garden friends. This would be a great time to get rid of all those unwelcome squatters called weeds.
Next, you’ll need to rake up all your leaves, if our wonderful NTX winds haven’t blown them to Cancun already. They can be added to your compost or be used as mulch. This will give you a clean slate to work with for your next resolution.
At this point, your garden may look like a lunar wasteland. But a half-full way to see it, as an artist sees a blank canvas, is that there are endless possibilities. Planning now allows you time to research plants, different designs, and drip irrigation and create a wish list. Seed catalogs are always fun reading, and placing orders is even better. Ordering this early gives you the best selection and time to prepare the seeds and start them indoors.
Last, but certainly not least, please don’t forget about us! Just because we look dormant doesn’t mean we don’t need care and water. If you’ve planted new babies in the fall, the top two to three inches must stay moist. The rest of us don’t need as much water as we do during our Sahara summers, but we shouldn’t dry out completely. If a hard freeze is coming, move our potted friends inside and cover the rest with freeze cloth.
In closing, we again want to thank you for taking such good care of us this past year. If you make the resolutions we have suggested, instead of drinking hot cocoa in the winter, you’ll be sipping iced tea in the spring, gazing at your amazing garden creation.
Happy Gardening!
Home: Denton County Master Gardener Association, dcmga.com