December: The Quiet Season

December is one of those months where the garden doesn’t demand much — and that’s exactly how I like it. It’s a good reminder that productive, family-friendly gardens aren’t meant to eat up every spare hour. They should run on their own momentum most of the time.

🛠 Jobs this month (low-effort focus)

• Do very little. Enjoy the winter silhouettes of perennials and grasses. Birds will be busy with seedheads; insects are tucked into hollow stems. We’ll cut everything back when new growth appears in spring.

• Prune elders. If you grow ornamental elders such as Sambucus nigra ‘Black Lace’, now’s the time to thin and shape. This variety will reward you with frothy pink blossom in summer and dark berries later on.

• Plant for wildlife. Instead of topping up feeders, think longer-term: elders, hawthorns, crab apples, and sea buckthorn all carry birds through winter without extra work from you. We're building ecosystems - not joblists.

• Planning in comfort. On quieter evenings, sketch out ideas for next year. (My Dream Garden Workbook is made for this — quick prompts that turn rough ideas into practical steps.)

🌿 Plant spotlight: Hardy citrus

Yes, you really can grow citrus outdoors in the UK if you pick the right species. Poncirus trifoliata (hardy lemon) and yuzu are both surprisingly tolerant of frost (down to about –15 °C). They’re not supermarket-sweet, but they add a zing to drinks and marmalade, and the plants themselves look striking year-round. A real conversation starter.

🪴 A note from my garden

I’ll admit, my garden isn’t manicured in December. There are soggy leaves on the paths and stems leaning all over the place. But it works. The structure still looks good, there’s food stored from earlier in the year, and wildlife is everywhere. That’s the point: a functional garden doesn’t have to be flawless — it has to fit into your life.

The best tip to carry you through winter is to incorporate evergreen structure, then the scruffy edges are far less noticeable. 

📖 If you want to explore more

• Edimentals booklet → unusual edibles to weave into your borders next year.

• Dream Garden Workbook → planning tool for winter evenings.

• Self-Sustaining Garden course → bigger picture of how to build a garden that gives back more than it takes.
  👉 Browse all free and paid resources here

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Wishing you a restful December by the fire,
Mike
Garden Footprint — real gardens that give more than they take