STIHL December Garden Guide with Jane Moore | December Gardening Jobs | STIHL GB

Описание: We’re back with the latest instalment of the STIHL garden guide! This month, Jane Moore showcases jobs to do in your garden in December. It’s almost Christmas and here at the December STIHL Garden Guide we’re feeling festive – and that includes making the most of the garden and all it has to offer.

🔶 Making a Christmas Wreath
There is so much that you can harvest from the garden to add to your Christmas decorations. Of course, the classic options are Holly and Ivy, and you can use these to dress up pictures and window frames, but there are so many other plants that you can use in interesting ways.

At Christmas, simply anything with berries is a must-have – Holly, Cotoneaster, and especially Pyracantha are great to dot around. Evergreens of any sort are great for decorations so things like Christmas box are perfect for table settings, laurels and even good old conifers are useful for bulking up bigger arrangements. And don’t forget fragrant evergreen herbs like Rosemary and Bay tree branches.

Dried stems of grasses, hydrangeas and even tough flower heads like Verbenas are great for decorations.

Once you’ve gathered all your foliage, you might fancy making a wreath which you can either hang on your door or use as a table centre decoration. You can add moss and foliage to a wreath ring, wrapping it with florist’s wire to hold it firm. Alternatively, you could recycle a ring from a previous year. Once you have a base layer of evergreens built up, then add the highlight foliage like variegated holly, some Euonymus of some lovely fragrant Rosemary. Next, add flower heads, grasses, and other elements like fruits and finish off with any baubles, pinecones, cinnamon sticks and a ribbon or two.

🔶 Top Dressing Alpines
Now we’re into the winter, potted alpines will benefit from a top dress of fresh gravel to keep them well-drained, especially where the plant meets the soil. Alpines hate getting too wet so this will help.

🔶 Winterising Cannas and Dahlias
Now that things like Cannas and Dahlias have succumbed to the cold weather it’s time to lift them to store the tubers for winter. Just clean them off and pot them into fresh compost, keeping them dry for the winter in the shed. If you have a very sheltered garden, you can get away with just mulching them with straw or leaf mould, but it can be risky.

Some plants are borderline hardy when it comes to surviving through the winter, so a little mulch will help these along. Move potted Agapanthus closer to the warm wall of the house and add a bit of straw in the crown to just give it a bit of extra protection. Remember when you’re mulching to be generous – it needs to be a couple of inches or five centimetres thick to make a difference. Use straw, bark, gravel or garden compost and don’t be afraid to mulch even hardy plants if your garden is very cold and prone to frosts.

🔶 Planting Bare Root Trees
These winter months are the best time for planting shrubs and trees. These are long-term plants that need time to settle into the ground and put down their roots.

Because these tend to be the taller plants in the garden as a rule – the big trees and shrubs or climbing and rambling roses - they need strong root systems to anchor them and a good root system to feed them too.

The great thing about bare root plants is that you get a lot of plant for your money – a container plant that costs the same amount is way smaller than bare root plants and that’s because the one in a pot needs so much more care from the growers.

Bare root plants are lifted in the dormant winter season, which gives you a bit of time before you need to worry about getting them in a permanent home. That extra time is especially helpful if you’re planting a great long hedge, with hundreds of plants to get in.

Bare root plants are great because they are so much more substantial, so you get an immediate impact in the garden. They look so much more natural than containerised plants as they have that hard-grown, wind-blown look that makes it look as if it’s been there for ages.

🔶 Wildlife Watch
Creating a log pile in your garden is a great way to provide a home for wildlife. In the video, Jane takes a look at one she made a couple of months ago to see what wildlife has made a home here.

Well, that’s it for this month, hopefully you’ve enjoyed these winter projects and don’t forget to subscribe to the STIHL GB YouTube channel for more ideas, hints and tips to help you make the most of your garden.

🔶 STIHL Website: https://www.stihl.co.uk/

🔶 Like us on Facebook:   / stihlgb  

🔶 Follow us on Instagram:   / stihlgb  

#STIHL #STIHLGB #DecemberGardenGuide #GardenGuide #STIHLGardenGuide #JaneMoore