Garden Preparation - December

Oh... No... December! For those of us without green houses, almost all our outside gardening work  in Rensselaer County, NY is past.  I still do have some curly leaf kale persisting in the garden, but that's all.  My other plants have succumbed to killing frosts. However, if you were conscientious last month and actually covered your carrots, beets and parsnips with a deep layer of straw, you may still may be harvesting. I hope you are.

In the mean time while you are waiting for next season's seed catalogs to start arriving in the mail, here are a few gardening related items you might consider doing to exercise that green thumb.

Culinary herbs

• Start a few culinary herbs indoors: The basic ones include chives, parsley, rosemary, thyme and basil. If you have space there is also oregano, cilantro, mint and lemon balm.  And, if you have even more space, you might want to try bay laurel (aka bay leaf) - actually a shrub that will work in a container.

• If you garden soil is still not frozen, check your carrots, and other root veggies. If they look alive, there is still time either to mulch them for later harvesting or you can simply dig them for storage indoors. If mulching, be sure to add a sheet of  plastic blanket over the mulch to help insulate the veggies from freezing.

• Don't wait any longer. Writing holiday cards can wait and get a jump on an early New Year's Resolution. Start that garden diary while you still remember a little bit of what you planted and how it did this year. You might even enter a note about what you want to do different next year.

And remember:

"The garden season officially begins January 1st and ends December 31." - Marie Huston, gardener and artist