Landscape

        • Check the moisture level of trees and shrubs planted within the past year. Make sure they don't dry out during winter dry spells. Shrubs under the eaves of the house are especially vulnerable.

        • Do filling or grading chores in the landscape now, so that loose soil can settle over the winter months.

        • Analyze your winter landscape. With leaves gone, you might consider planting evergreens for privacy.

        • Sharpen lawnmower blades before winter storage. Empty the gas tank or add fuel stabilizer. Change engine oil and clean the filters.

Flowers

        • Prune top heavy roses back by 1/3 to prevent swaying in the wind. Do not prune heavily until March.

        • Protect the graft union on rose bushes by mounding soil over it and mulching.

        • Mulch roses. Put chicken wire around the plants and add leaves to about 2 feet or so.

Vegetables

        • Leave parsnips, turnips and Jerusalem Artichoke roots in the ground and harvest as needed. Protect with a heavy mulch layer.

        • Mulch strawberries when temperatures have dropped to 20 degrees .

        • Wash garden tools with soap and water, dry and store in a protected location.

Houseplants

        • Stop fertilizing non-flowering houseplants for the winter. Resume fertilizing in April.

        • Pot up tulip bulbs for forcing indoors. Expose bulbs to 8-12 weeks of refrigeration before bringing the plants out to flower.

        • Stock up on blooming indoor plants — cyclamen, azaleas or streptocarpus — to chase away the winter blues —.

Eco tip

        Mulch correctly. Wait until the ground has frozen to add mulch around perennials and young landscape plants that can be heaved out of the soil by alternate freezing and thawing. The mulch helps keep the soil frozen at an even temperature until spring. Do not mulch over the crowns of the plants, or they may stay too wet and rot.
       Contact Sue Trusty by e-mail: strusty@civicgardencenter.org; phone: 221-8733.
       

Clarification

        The phone number for Koch Tree Farm, corner of Ohio 129 and Ohio 732 in Reily Township, Butler County, is 756-1998. The number was omitted from a list of cut-your-own Christmas trees published in Tempo last Saturday.

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