December in the country

Article from the rubric "Calendar of gardener's and gardener's works"

With the onset of winter work in the garden and the garden diminished.

All the main things have already been done: they carried out sanitary pruning of trees and clearing the land from plant residues, removed shoots of trees and shrubs, excess strawberry whiskers, diseased plants. Dug up and fertilized

pristvolny circles. Perennial plants prepared for winter. If you do not have time, in early December you can still catch up ...

    Protect garden trees from frost

Your garden: work of the month.

In December, a very crucial period for garden plants is a transition to a state of rest. Trees and shrubs more useful to pass this period as quickly as possible.

What determines the frost resistance of fruit and berry crops? In many ways, from us, gardeners. They were delayed in harvesting the trees - the winter hardiness decreased, since the trees had less time to prepare for wintering.

If in the fall too much organic matter was poured into the tree trunk circle, they lowered the winter hardiness of the tree, since organic matter contains a lot of nitrogen, and it prolongs the vegetation of the plants, leaving them no time to prepare for winter. An even worse result is obtained if in the fall nitrogen fertilizers are applied in excess of the norm.

Autumn rate of nitrogen - no more than 3 g per square meter. m. It is necessary for trees to feed the roots, which continue to grow in winter.

   Harvest cuttings for grafting

In early December, before the onset of severe frosts, you can cut cuttings from trees for winter or spring grafting. Store them in a sandbox in a cool place. If the cuttings are not many, you can keep them in the refrigerator, wrapped in a damp cloth and put in a plastic bag. In the repository, set the branches vertically. Spud them with sand.

Cut the branches for cuttings from the south side of the crown, from healthy fruit trees. The length of branches is up to 40 cm. Tops, not matured, very short branches with close buds are not suitable.

We prepare cuttings for vaccination.

When harvesting annual branches of actinidia, sea buckthorn, honeysuckle, do not confuse the upper end with the lower one: make the upper cut straight 1 cm above the kidney, and the lower edge - oblique - 1.5 cm below the kidney.

In actinidia, the kidneys are hidden under the bark. Make both slices - straight and oblique - in the middle of internodes.

In sea buckthorn, do not confuse cuttings with female and male plants. It is better to mark them in any way.

    What did not have time to do in the fall - you can finish now

Not cope with sanitary pruning of trees in November, you can continue in the first decade of December, if the frost is up to 10 degrees. Cut dry and diseased branches of pome breeds. Stone sandstone set aside until spring.

Now the crowns of the trees are free of leaves, it is easier to see the pests that have settled for the winter: a nest of golden-tail leaves, haws, dried fruit are sources of infection. Cut them with shears or delimbers.

On the bark of trees at the base of the trunks, on the stumps, at the bottom of the fences, buildings, stacked logs, you can find the egg-laying of an unpaired moth. They are covered with a thin layer of hairs and look like yellowish-gray pads with a diameter of 2-3 cm.

Caterpillar of an unpaired silkworm.

In the spring, at the same time as the budding of the eggs, small dark caterpillars emerge, covered with long hairs, thanks to which they are easily carried by the wind through the garden. Each of them can destroy from 12 to 35 leaves. In some years (once in 6-10 years), the silkworm can multiply strongly and destroy all the leaves on the trees in the garden.

Scrape off an unpaired silkworm with a metal spoon.

With a sharp decrease in temperature and the absence of snow, roots can freeze, especially for young trees or short plants (on clonal rootstocks). Zamulchirovte pristvolny circles with compost or humus layer of 8-10 cm.

If there is a lot of snow, at a temperature of about 0 degrees shake it from the trees of winter varieties that have not dropped foliage. Accumulating on leaves and branches, it can break branches. First, shake the snow from the lower branches, and then from those above.

When snow falls, try to cover the strawberries, especially 1-2-year-old. For the retention of snow, lay out flower stems in a section of the branch left over from pruning trees and shrubs. The branches should not be diseased: moniliose, powdery mildew.

Puff loose snow in tree circles. Dense snow is an obstacle for mice on their way to the bark of trees and shrubs.

Sprinkle the soil or compost under the base of berry bushes (layer 5-8 cm).

If you didn’t whitewash the trees in November, you can do it in December, in frost-free weather. Bind young trees: from sunburn and rodents.

In young trees, carefully pull the skeletal branches to the trunk and tie them up with string or rope. Tie and bushes currant, gooseberry, Chinese cherry. This will save them from rifts under the weight of snow.

A good protective tool is spraying the plants with lime milk. It reduces evaporation, and therefore, the desiccation of plants, protects the branches from sunburn. Prepare the solution as follows: 1 kg of lime is dissolved in 10 liters of water and sprayed crowns in frost-free weather.

    Check how vegetables are stored in the basement

Constantly monitor the fruits deposited. The best temperature for storing most varieties of apples plus 1-2 degrees. To support it, open it for a day, and at night close the vents in the storage and ventilate the room periodically.

Periodically check the safety of vegetables in the basement.

To maintain optimum humidity (85-90 percent), if necessary, put water containers in storage. Remove diseased and damaged fruits.

    In December it's time to hang the bird feeders.

Winter is a difficult time for birds. Many are dying from starvation and cold. Gardeners should help their feathered friends: install feeders in the garden and systematically fill them.

Birds can be any grain (except buckwheat), sunflower seeds, white bread crumbs. Titmies love unsalted bacon, cut into small pieces.

For the care in winter, the birds will thank you, destroying in the spring and summer of dangerous garden pests.

    Even in December, gardeners will find work

Your garden: work of the month.

In December, the season of the most zealous summer residents is not yet complete, because it is possible to carry out podzimnye crops, warm the beds of garlic, onions, perennial vegetables with compost, hang bird feeders, feed the dogs and cats left by the owners at the cottages. But even after all these works have been completed, there is still time to replenish the treasury of our agronomic knowledge ...

Garden in the winter.

    We make a work plan for the next season

And it's time to think about where and what we will plant on the plot next season, i.e., make a plan for future plantings.

Properly composed crop rotation is the first, one can say, main point in a large list of measures aimed at increasing the productivity of plants, their resistance to diseases, pests, and measures that not only conserve but also increase the fertility of the soil.

Permanent cultivation of vegetables leads to the accumulation of pests, diseases peculiar to the culture, the impoverishment of the soil. When changing crops, the negative effects are leveled, compliance with crop rotation allows to get high yields of healthy, pesticide-free vegetables every year.

Planning is also needed in order to decide how much what kind of seeds, fertilizers, and seedlings to buy.

Take a notebook and draw a plan for your garden. Having numbered the beds, we will select a culture for each, taking into account the previous cultures and how they were fertilized. Ideally, if we are able to remember which vegetables grew in the beds, not only last season, but 2-3 years ago.

We start planning for the next season with the most ambitious vegetables.

We will try to keep the notebook, so that in the following seasons we will make crop rotation not according to memory, but according to the scheme. We will try not to return to the previous place before 3-4 years not only the culture itself, but also other plants of the family.

For example, after the potatoes do not plant:

• tomatoes
• pepper
• eggplants
• Physalis

after cabbage:

• radish
• daikon
• radish

after the bow:

• garlic

after cucumbers:

• zucchini
• pumpkin, etc.

In the notebook with the scheme of crop rotation, other records may later find a place: the time of sowing or planting seedlings, when and how the plants were fertilized, processed, what kind of crop was obtained, etc.

A separate column can be added to the cost of purchasing seeds, fertilizers, growth stimulants, at the end of the season to reduce the "debit" with a loan "and understand how economically profitable our beds.

Although for many summer residents it is more important not the profit obtained from the garden, but ecological purity, the taste of the grown fruit.

    We are finally going shopping

While there is time, we are like in December for country shops. You can already buy seeds of crops that have long retained their germination: cabbage, tomatoes, cucumbers, zucchini, pumpkins, peppers, eggplants, peas, beans.

Thus, we will save a little, because the seeds of the new crop, most likely, will cost more.

But the seeds of carrots, onions, green crops are better to buy later - from fresh batches, because they do not last long enough for germination.

In December, it is necessary to hang out feeders for birds.

    It's time to cook the land for seedlings

Before sowing seeds for seedlings is still far away, but we already need to take care of soil mixtures. In order to free the soil prepared for seedlings from the stock of weed seeds, it is brought from the frost into heat, kept for several days, creating conditions for weed seeds to germinate, and again put to the frost, where the seedlings will die.

If you repeat this operation several times, after sowing the seeds for seedlings in the soil treated in this way, you will not have to guess if the weeds have grown or the vegetables sprouted.

And low temperatures will help to free the soil from pests, pathogens.

Whether the harvested (or purchased) soil is suitable for growing seedlings is also advisable to check in advance. And it is better if the experience is not for the sake of experience. Sow in a bowl filled with a seedling mixture, seeds of lettuce or dill, spinach or Chinese cabbage.

Let's wait for the shoots and watch them. If they develop normally, it means that the soil will also fit for growing vegetable seedlings. However, it is necessary to take into account that the well-being, temperature and humidity of the air and soil also influence the well-being of plants.

In winter, we work here in such gardens.

Therefore, it would be good to equip additional lighting for the vegetable garden on the windowsill, to protect pots or boxes from the cold air of windows and hot streams from radiators. By creating favorable conditions, you can even throw a few cucumber seeds into the soil in order to receive the first fruits from your window sill in February.

We continue to chase onions on feathers, parsley, celery, chard, sorrel. You can put in pots small beet roots, a few cloves of garlic. In winter, any greens brings joy and vitamins. Fresh greens will be very useful for decorating the New Year's table.

    What are flower growers doing in December?

Your flower garden: work month.

There are things for flower growers in winter too. When visiting the country, we additionally sprinkle with leaves, compost perennials, bulbous plants, because there is not always much snow in December.

Therefore, one should always keep in reserve material for additional shelter of perennials in case of severe snow-free frosts. If enough snow falls, grabbing it from the tracks, we will additionally cover our flower beds. The thicker the snow layer, the greater the chances of a happy winter for our pets.

We will tie up the columnar crowns of thujas and junipers with string, so that their branches do not break off under the weight of snow or ice.

We will not be able to help our pets with anything else. Let's hope for their perseverance and the mercy of nature.

    At the beginning of winter we go to work in the house

And we will turn our attention to indoor plants. Some of them in the winter can please bloom.

The flowering of Saintpaulia that began in autumn will not stop. If in the summer there was no transcendental heat, then the African violets seemed to thank for it all with new and new flower stalks. To Saintpaulia bloom a little longer, artificially extend for them a day to 12 hours.

Having rested from the summer, the euharis, the valotta bloomed, on the light window-sills daily the new flowers of the hibiscus growing over the summer are blooming. The “beaks” of flower stalks have already appeared in Hippeastrum bulbs, which have successfully passed the period of cooling in the autumn garden.

The bulbs that spent the summer in the room are a bit late. So that the hippeastrums not only bloom well, but also gain strength for flowering next season, transplant the plants into a fresh soil mixture.

Carefully shake the onion out of the pot, remove the old soil, while trying to preserve the roots as much as possible, place it in a new pot, the diameter of which should be 2-3 cm larger than the diameter of the onion, and filled with a mixture of turf soil, humus, peat and sand (2: 1 : 1: 1). The bulb should be only 2/3 or half submerged in the soil.

We constantly check for untapped gippeastrum. As soon as the inflorescence “clings” at the top of the bulb, put the pot into the light and start watering.

Decembrist in December.

December - the top of the decorative zigokaktus (Decembrists). But so that they are pleased with abundant flowering, they need coolness - not higher than 16 degrees. Sharp temperature fluctuations during this period are unacceptable, as, however, and other stresses: cutting cuttings, moving from place to place.

Coolness is also needed for the Persian cyclamen that blooms in winter - 14-18 degrees. Water it with a tuber-rhizome plant, preventing overdrying and stagnation of water in the pot. Water should not fall into the middle of the rosette of leaves, so it is best to pour into the pan.

The plants that bloom in winter are supported by top dressing: twice a month, we water with weak solutions (1 g per liter of water) of complete or complex fertilizer.

In January we plant gloxynia tubers, begonias in a mixture of leafy ground, peat and sand, find a bright place for them and sprinkle it moderately until germs appear.

But the majority of indoor plants in December, not to bloom. They suffer from a lack of light, too warm and dry air. Roses, geraniums, fuchsias (and not only them) in such conditions lose leaves, their shoots are drawn in search of light. To alleviate their fate by lowering the temperature or additional lighting.

We make sure that the frost days do not overcool the root ball of plants located on the window sills, the floor. It would be nice to put each pot on a wooden stand. We regularly spray the plants, wash them under the shower, thereby trying to improve the winter microclimate even a little.

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