• Adding charcoal chips to plants grown in water, will keep the water sweet.
• After Amaryllis flowers have faded, remove them but keep the plant growing to replenish the bulb.
• A good idea before ordering from catalogs is to plan ahead, where you are going to plant and grow these new additions to the garden.
• Any Christmas Cactus that is still blooming, will appreciate a half cup of water every 3 days
• Bring in your pots of early Tulips, Hyacinthus and Narcissus to begin forcing.
• Brush heavy snow from evergreens with a broom.
• Build or repair garden furniture and trellises.
• Camphor flakes in a saucer under African violets are said to keep off mites.
• Check now and make sure that you have enough plant labels, if planning to start any seeds indoors.
• Cut back fertilizer applications to your house plants.
• Cut branches of Pussy Willow and Forsythia to bring indoors for forcing.
• If the temperature drops below 10°F, cover your coldframe sash with straw mats.
• Inspect Apple trees, Lilacs and Euonymus for oyster shell scale. Prune first, then wash with Lime Sulphur.
• Make sure that all bird-feeding stations are kept filled.
• Making seed flats is a good indoor job, on cold wintery days.
• Nothing solves a field mouse problem like a lean, hungry cat.
• On these garden-less days, take the time and draw up a planting chart or diagram of your garden.
• Place cyclamens in a cool room and keep their soil moist.
• Plant paperwhite narcissus in a shallow dish filled with water.
• Pot up cold storage Lily-of-the-Valley and they will bloom in 21 days.
• Re-tie any Climbing Rose branches that may have worked loose and are whipping in the wind.
• Seeds can be tested for germination and vigor, by placing them on wet blotters. Be sure to count and label them accordingly.
• Speaking of Garden Clubs, try to attend your next meeting.
• Start geranium seeds indoors now, for summer bedding plants.
• Start gloxinias in a moist soil mixture.
• Sow coleus and begonia seeds indoors now.
• Take cuttings of your African violets
• This is a good time to repot Cactus.
• Try using sterilized soil in some of your seed flats this year.
• When Poinsettias drop their leaves, stop watering and put them in a cool place to rest.
• When the temperature is above 40 °F, reapply anti-desiccants to evergreens to prevent sun damage and wind burn.
• When watering house plants, be sure that the water is at room temperature.
• Wipe mealy bugs from house plants with a cotton swab diped in alcohol.
• Wood ashes saved now can go on the Rose beds in April.
• You could start the New Year by exterminating aphids on house plants, but why not instead, mix up some eggnog and call in your neighbors.
