January is all about extending our summer crops to create a lovely continuity. Successional planting is the proper name. I call it “little and often”, and it’s the key to never going hungry because it keeps your garden in steady production.
And though most of us are only just starting to eat tomatoes, now is the time to think about dinner in Autumn. Get some new, long term stuff planted to keep your vegie patch steadily abundant all the way from Summer through Autumn. Not in an excessive, big mission way, but a little and often, regular way.
What to sow and plant in January
DIRECT SOW
- Coriander, rocket, radish and landcress (one of my favs!) along the picking edge on the shady side of taller summer crops
- Carrots and parsnips for places with cool autumns. If autumn is baking hot at yours perhaps wait another month
- A mixed greencrop to prep the soil for brassicas
- Calendula, cornflower, marigold, bishops flower, phacelia, honesty and borage. Sprinkle alyssum seed in the cracks in the paving! Choose vigorous self seeders that in the future, will pop up of their own accord. Self sufficient plants we love and adore.
TRAY SOW
- Celery, silverbeet, chard, perpetual spinach or kale for autumn and winter harvests. Chard and perpetual beet self seed readily so let them develop seedheads over summer and you will never need sow them again.
- Brassicas for autumn: a couple each of cauli, cabbage + broccoli every 3 weeks or so from now in, brings mixed, regular harvests from autumn through spring. Cover with insect mesh or be on cabbage white caterpillar patrol.
- Leeks, early January for winter eating. They take ages from seed (about 10 weeks) so start now.
- Keep the flowers coming – zinnias, sunflowers, stock, hollyhock, aster, anise hyssop, coreopsis, chamomile, to name a few.
- The last lot of cucumber or zucchini for warmer regions or the greenhouse.
DIRECT OR TRAY SOW
- Saladings choose heat lovers like Tree lettuce, Merveille de Quarter Saison, Drunken Woman, Oak Leaf, Summer Queen
- Beetroot Use the picking edges. Such a small efficient crop, they can be squeezed in anywhere.
- Basil is best young. Keep a fresh supply all summer/ autumn long with little and often sowings. Sow direct into warm garden soil or a tray.
- Green beans – dwarf or climbing, for warmer regions or the greenhouse. Get climbers in early this month for cropping from mid March. As long as they don’t dry out they’ll crop till May or it gets cold – which ever comes first.
TRANSPLANT
- Basil, marigolds and tomatoes – the classic trio. My January planted, greenhouse tomatoes usually out shine spring planted ones. They’ll carry on until late autumn/ early winter (tastiest tomatoes of the year!). If you are planting outside (ie not in a greenhouse), choose hardy cocktails or fast cropping bush or determinate varieties like Baxters Early or good old Russian Red.
- Zuchinni, for a most useful Autumn harvest
- Cucumber can go outside if its warm enough for another few months, otherwise plant in the greenhouse
- Corn in warmer regions if you have enough water.
- If January isnt roasting hot, potatoes can go in. Be sure they don’t dry out. Cover with insect mesh to keep psyllids and aphids out, or dot about beneath fruit trees, disguised amongst the herbal ley in luscious piles of organic matter.
- Spring onions and leeks. Both are most useful when coming into the kitchen in a staggered fashion, so space your plantings out, unless you live somewhere cool, in which case this month may well be your one and only moment.
- Brassicas and leafy greens flourish in mild, moist conditions – all the things that the middle of summer is not. Shade is the answer.
- Brussels sprouts take ages to fatten up, so get seedlings in the ground this month.
- Companion flowers into the garden and greenhouse
HARVEST
- Harvest shellout beans
- Harvest onions and shallots when tops start flopping over.
In the Greenhouse
It’s a bit like housekeeping in the January greenhouse. As well as successional plantings, as mentioned in the diary above, keep up with:
- Daily removal of older ratty foliage and laterals to keep good airflow
- Tie new growths in and wind up strings to prevent branches/ laterals breaking under strain of heavy fruits.
- Keep mulch topped up
- Keep on top of pests
- A daily harvest, to keep plants productive and break pest cycles
- Drape shade cloth over the wires – its more about warmth than light and a bit of shade makes an epic difference to plant health when the sun beats down. Leave the doors open at night for good airflow.
Moist soil is healthy soil!
Keeping soil moist during summer, keeps it in good condition for planting winter crops. As your soil builds and improves, it’ll handle hot weather better, but if you are in the beginning stages of building your soil – take heart, it’ll be better year on year.
Meantime, slow evaporation and make moisture last by planting new seedlings with vermicastings or homemade compost, plant close, erect shadecloth over seedlings or plant them beneath older crops and keep mulch topped up.
If water is in short supply, hand water directly onto plants that need it most giving preference to the young and fruiting plants over older, finishing crops.
Keep your garden fertility up
Don’t let your soil fertility go backwards! Bolster it as best you can so as to avoid an epic soil building mission in autumn.
Piling on a mixture of mulch is an easy way to keep soil in good heart. Moisten your soil first before topping it up. Make a mixture of old, ratty foliage, trimmings from rambunctious plants, slash down long grass in wild areas, forage for leaves, seaweed or mow the lawns – use what you got my friends.
Make compost. A new, easy peasy compost pile a month will keep your garden going. Build a pile direct on top of any beds that have dried out.
Boost the whole garden with biological spray. Where soil is poor or disease rife, use weekly, otherwise one a month is tickety boo.
Dollop seaweed, vermicastings, well rotten manure or trench bokashi as prep for heavy feeders or where soil is poor.
Manage pests + weeds for an easy autumn
Do yourself the biggest of favours and take a garden wander everyday to smother weeds or squash pests. Catch things before epidemics occur. If aphids or whitefly are going for it, spray them with Neem weekly until numbers abate. Naturally Neem is really good – it only takes a couple of sprays.
Keep on top of cabbage white caterpillars on young brassica seedlings – either by squashing daily or covering the crop with insect mesh.
Collect + save seed
Save tomato and bean seed
Collect flower and lettuce seeds. Either save them or use them right away in the easiest of fashions by crunching up the dry plants on the spot where you want them next.
Manage pumpkin vines
Pinch out the tips of pumpkin vines from now on in, to stop growth and send energy to developing fruits.
