TIDEWATER GARDENING
by K. Marc Teffeau, Ph.D.
The January Landscape Happy 2013! If you are reading this, then I guess the Mayan calendar was wrong and the end of the world as we know it did not occur. So, let’s start thinking about surviving the winter gardening blues and getting excited for the spring. Since I’m not able to prognosticate the type of winter we will have with conventional methods such as a bum knee or the width of the woolly bear stripes, I will assume that we are moving into a “normal” January for us. December was fairly mild and the nice aspect was that we received a decent amount of rainfall in November and December to help recharge the water levels in the landscape. Even if we have a fairly mild January, we will still be stuck inside looking out at the dreary landscape. If we have a few days of nice weather, however, there are still a few things you can do in the yard. If you have a grape vine in the garden, January is a good time to prune it.
The Mayan Calendar - if you are reading this, the world didn’t end. Make sure that your pruning shears are sharp and clean. If you have any questions about pruning your grape vine, there are a couple of instructional videos on YouTube that you can watch that you might find helpful. They will show you the basic methods. I find that the four-armed Kniffin system is the easiest to use. 83