Green Capital Gardening Blog:
Part 2
This is your guide to all things gardening related throughout the Green Capital year. Each month our resident blogger will share tips on how to get started with food growing, and where to find projects and community gardens in your area. You'll discover that gardening isn’t just a summer time hobby but something that can be done 52 weeks of the year!
As the days begin to slowly lengthen, they lead us gently towards spring and the beginning of a new growing season.
So what can you do now? Well, sowing shallots and planting out onion sets and garlic is definitely a winter job.
If you find your ground is particularly wet or clayey they can all be started off in modules and planted out later in the winter when things are drier and crisper, although never in a frost.
Now is also the time to prune apple and pear trees, preparing them to quit in the year ahead.
The main aim of fruit pruning is to encourage fruiting, taking out dead or dying branches and removing branches that are crossing one another, to create a tree that is open and has lots of light and air getting to it, enabling good fruit setting and pollination.
However, do not prune stone fruits such as plums or cherries now but wait until after they have fruited in the summer to prune.
It is also the best time to plant bare root trees and shrubs, which although are increasingly rare to find in garden centres and nurseries, are easily available from some great online suppliers.
To establish bare rooted plants successfully the roots must be soaked in water before planting and they must be planted to the same depth as they were in the earth on their nursery, but planted during the deepest months of winter, you will see life and at least flowers this coming season, and hopefully fruit the following season.
The most important thing, however, in the deepest of the winter, is preparation.
Getting outside and cleaning up your tools, sharpening knives, secateurs and lawnmower blades, tidying your shed or just emptying the pots on your balcony, keep you involved in the garden, seeing the changes and helping you to sit gently in the season.
Order seed catalogues and decide what it is you might want to grow this year and get out there and visit a local nursery.
And so for this month’s recipe it has to be one that celebrates the humble Brussels sprout, and is from the wonderful Tom Hunt of Poco on Stokes Croft and The Natural Cook fame.
Any sprouts knocking about unused after Christmas can be used raw to surprising effect in this crisp, fresh, seed-filled salad. Serve with leftover turkey for a light, invigorating lunch.
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