FULL MOON 6th March

Garden

  • Lovely time in the garden, warm, soil is still very alive and getting ready for it’s rest!
  • Feed if necessary three days after full moon.
  • In warmer areas this is the last chance to sow carrots and beetroot before Spring
  • Go hard to get the last of your beds into carbon crops before it’s too cold for them to grow. Check out the carbon and compost crop mixes on our website.

Temperate Forest Garden

  • Finish planting spring bulbs
  • Begin wrenching any trees for shifting this winter after the first rain, wrenching one side only this month.
  • Note any trees that need removing this autumn /winter
  • Begin preparing ground for new orchard plantings in winter
  • Second optimal time for feeding fruit trees is April/May so get another soil test if you wish and apply your fert now or over the next few weeks or spread ramial wood chip

LAST QUARTER 13th April

Garden

  • Double dig or prepare all remaining beds for winter crops or compost crops
  • Empty chook straw yards onto garden and give chooks fresh material for the winter
  • Manure brassica beds as they are gross feeders
  • Pick and store main crop apples, pears, potatoes, kumara, pumpkin and dried beans
  • Clean out kikuyu barriers
  • Transplant last seedlings
  • Prepare strawberry beds for May planting, they do very well with ramial woodchip as mulch or pine needles

Temperate Forest garden

  • Feed the fungi and microbes in the soil now to ensure tree health next season, with ramial wood chip, and or fert, compost, mulch
  • Great time to inoculate ramial wood chip with King Stropharia mushroom spawn, so long as no chickens around to scratch it all up
  • Tie up boysenberries, loganberries, blackberries and raspberries
  • Trim blueberries and Chilean cranberries
  • Begin collecting fallen leaves to make chicken manure compost in the chicken house, leaf mould, hot beds etc.
  • Great time to chop and drop and also make ramial wood chip

NEW MOON 20th April

Garden

  • Prepare garlic, shallot and tree onion beds, manure and compost well, make sure the beds are very free draining
  • Prepare any other beds you have the energy to double dig or U Bar. This is a good month for bed preparation to help avoid stress in spring. The more aerated the soil is over the winter the easier it will be in spring. The best compost crop for keeping the soil aerated over winter is Vetch and broad beans.
  • Direct sow rocket, cornsalad, ruruhau, Borecole, Mustard lettuce and mizuna under cloche to eat as fresh salad greens (mesclun) over winter
  • Sow violas, pansies, heartsease, poppies and snap dragons for Spring flowering
  • Last chance to plant lupins and other compost crops
  • Plant broad beans into trays and transplant when first leaves appear
  • Plant brassicas now – broccoli, kale, cabbage, cauli etc for early Spring transplanting
  • Transplant last of the winter veges and flowers

Perennials

  • Now is a good time to go onto the Koanga website shop to check out perennials such potatoes (perennials but grown as annuals), garlic etc before they run out. They only come into stock when we are clear of amounts so put your name on the wait lists for products you are interested in.
  • Prepare beds for strawberries and transplant

Temperate Forest Garden

  • Great time to chop and drop, and make ramial wood chip
  • Clean up orchard herbal ley and Mediterranean herb banks, replanting if necessary
  • Last chance to plant subterranean clover and alfalfa in orchard herbal ley
  • Last chance to get drainage, fencing, shifting of compost and mulch in preparation for tree planting  next month done
  • Apply tree paste to tree trunks

FIRST QUARTER 28th April

Garden

  • Plant compost/carbon crops for winter
  • Plant strawberry runners
  • Plant winter salad greens under Microclima cloth or cloches or cold frames
  • Transplant flowers for early spring flowering, heartsease, snap dragons, calendula larkspur, love in a mist, hollyhock
  • Feed all brassicas, celery, beetroot salad greens that need it while the soil is still warm and active

Temperate Forest Garden

  • Feed citrus well now, manure, seaweed, rock phosphate, dolomite and mulch
  • Weed eat drains now to facilitate good water flow in winter