What to plant and harvest in January: garden calendar

we are in a time of little activity in the orchard, so it is a good time to start digging the soil and prepare everything for when the good weather arrives and we can have transplantable plants on the terraces with well-fertilized and dug soil or, in the case of the trees in the fruit orchard, in open holes and fertilized soil well in advance.

We can take advantage of this month to rethink the distribution of crops, make new terraces or new cultivation areas or we will rebuild those that deteriorated last season.

What to plant in January

Low winter temperatures and even possible night frosts, the protection of the seedbeds is essential if we want to have seedlings ready to transplant when good weather comes. If there is no risk of frost, it will suffice to sow one in a small tunnel covered with plastic or create a structure with a glass roof.

Sowing in warm or protected bed seedbeds: leek, onion, tomato and, optionally, pepper, zucchini, cucumber or aubergine in warm areas. Sseedbeds in open air: celery, lamb’s lettuce, lettuce, arugula, escarole, cabbage, Russian kale, collard greens, chard or red beets. You sow directly into the ground: garlic, radishes, lamb’s lettuce, spinach, early carrots and potatoes in warm areas, and broad beans in cold areas. Land transplants: onion, strawberries, lettuce, leek, arugula, chard, celery, cabbage, broccoli and spring cauliflower.

How to plant in January

Garlic. If we want them to make good heads -to save- by harvesting them at the beginning of summer, the ideal thing to do is to sow directly on the ground now, preferably on a full or waning moon. Wonder lettuce. Good time to sow and transplant marigold and summer marigold lettuce; they tolerate the cold well and, if their cycle is prolonged, they take time to spike and flower in the spring heat. strawberries. A great time to transplant the runners of these bushes to the ground. They like slightly acidic soil: add 2-3 kg of worm humus per m2 and mulch them with a layer of fresh pine needles. Peas. Leave the seeds soaked for 1 or 2 days to start germination, and sow in small holes 20 cm apart in loose soil rich in humus, without fresh organic matter. They will be in spring. Potatoes. In temperate zones, early potatoes can be planted and the ideal is to do it on a full or waning moon. Fertilize the soil with compost or well rotted manure. The day before sowing, cut each potato into pieces, leaving a little hole in each one: the potato will germinate from it. Bury them 5-6cm deep in lines 60cm apart, leaving 25-30cm between them. Put a hose with interlining drippers and cover with 5-7 cm of straw. You can harvest in May or June.

What to harvest in January

If we have maintained a good planning of sowings and transplants at the end of summer and during the autumn and the good weather accompanies, in January we can be harvesting:

endives They are often blanched to eat the less bitter and more tender inner leaves. But the green and bitter leaves have more properties: you can use them in salads or stews. Artichokes. In Mediterranean areas, it is its best time. The intense cold, without freezing, thickens them and makes them very tender. The flavor is intensified by the greater presence of polyphenols and other substances. Chinese cabbage. The pe-tsai is necked and cut at the base. Although it looks like lettuce, it has the properties of a cabbage. The pak-choi grows like chard: its open leaves can be thinned out. Spinach. Friends of cold and humidity, you can wait for the bushes to grow more and harvest them from the roots, or thin out the largest outer leaves and thus lengthen the harvest period. Chard broccoli thistles endives Brussels sprouts cauliflowers Broad beans Peas Kales from Russia lettuce turnips leeks radishes arugula

Garden chores in January

Protect crops from the cold

With the arrival of the winter cold we will try start uprooting or harvesting cold-sensitive plants that are still left in the garden (such as leeks, endives, some varieties of lettuce, or cabbage sprouts).

If our garden is in very cold areas -with risks of frost- It is convenient that we have some thermal meshes to cover at night the crops that can remain in the ground all winter, thus avoiding those very low temperatures affecting them.

Carrots can be covered with straw for which, apart from preventing them from being damaged by the cold, the soil is soft and it is easier to pull them out of the ground when we harvest them.

A plastic tunnel or a small greenhouse they will allow us to continue harvesting some less cold tolerant vegetables.

Prepare a good start to the horticultural year

The low light and the cold, typical of winter, plunge the garden into a kind of parenthesis or lethargy, which gives us plenty of time to take stock of the past horticultural year, being able to evaluate the crops and techniques that worked well and review the possible problems we had to face.

It is the ideal time to start a new notebook as a field notebook or get an agenda or an annual calendar, where you can go drawing the sketches of the distribution of the terraces, plan crops throughout the year, and write down the tasks and incidents that arise on a day-to-day basis.

The lunar calendar that we publish annually may be very useful for these tasks.

Prepare the land for spring crops

Planting and widespread transplanting into the open ground begins in mid-March in temperate zones. But first we must have prepared the soil well.

For nutrient-demanding crops -tomatoes, aubergines, peppers or zucchini-, and in poor lands without much reserve of organic matter, when digging we can add 6 to 10 kg per m2 of compost or well decomposed manure.

For moderately demanding crops –as plants with leaves or roots–, 3 to 4 kg per m2 of well-decomposed compost or worm humus will suffice.

For undemanding crops -like beans or carrots-, we add 1 or 2 kg per m2.

Feeding the microbiota with background fertilizers

Winter cold slows down and blocks the activity of soil microorganisms responsible for the breakdown of nutrients and the generation of stimulating substances (essential for proper plant development), but when the spring sun begins to warm the earth, it is convenient that the myriad of bacteria, mycorrhizae and soil microorganisms have access to abundant food and decomposing organic matter to carry out its active work, with which it will unfold the nutrients and abundantly feed the cultivated plants.

But we don’t have to wait for it to get hot to provide these nutrients to the microorganisms in the soil, it’s better take advantage of this winter season to spread abundant rotted manure or a good compost around the trees and on the land where we plan to sow or plant the spring and summer crops.

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