Gardening tips for November 2025

Hands up! Who’s bought their Christmas tree? If not, have you thought about it? Most Christmas trees are cut by September or October (unless you can get one cut for you at a local grower). So, it isn’t as daft as it sounds to buy your tree early because you can get it home and stand it in a bucket of water in the garden until it is time to bring it indoors. This will ensure it has a supply of much needed water for as long as possible to avoid the dreaded needles falling off, although that is only really a problem with the good old Norway Spruce, the ones we had years ago that lost all their needles by Boxing Day. 

Most Christmas trees these days are either Nordman or Frazer Firs and tend to keep hold of their leaves. One thing to remember is to cut off the bottom 2 cm of the trunk which is sealed, otherwise the tree stands no chance of drawing up any water from the bucket. The later one buys a tree, the longer it has been standing without water and if the garden centre does get a fresh supply of trees they will not be newly cut, instead moved from another store that hadn’t sold them.

The kitchen garden

Look after your brassicas! Pigeons are always on the lookout for something else to eat and brassicas are an easy meal, therefore covering them at least gives the gardener a chance of keeping some of the crop for their own consumption. Don’t forget to support the netting otherwise heavy pigeons will soon flatten it. Brussel sprouts are best staked to stop them falling over with the weight of all those delicious sprouts destined for Christmas dinner.

Plant garlic for an early summer crop. They are supposed to like the cold so November should be ideal. Plant with their pointed tops about 2.5 cm under the soil surface. Onion sets can also be planted in autumn, into prepared soil. Plant onion sets about 15cm apart and with their tops level with the soil surface. Give them a firm push into the ground to help stop birds from pulling them out and give the roots something to grab hold of otherwise the onions may emerge from the ground letting the birds know there is something they have missed.

Salad plants are surprisingly resilient to cold weather, the hardiest varieties such as Mizuna can be planted out under cover or placed on a sunny windowsill for a winter crop.

The flower garden

Asters are excellent flowering plants for the autumn and the garden centres have loads of them because they look great. Definitely a good choice for autumn colour. If the plants available at the garden centre are looking past their best they have probably been reduced in price so now is a good time to buy for a colourful show next year. You may, however, have trouble finding the word ‘Aster’. This is because this genus is huge and those in the know have decided to reclassify them to make it easier for us gardeners to understand. The new name for the Asters we know, the Michaelmas Daisy types are now called Symphyotrichum. I’m not sure the new name with gain much traction so let’s just call them Asters!

Tomatoes – sort of!

Do you remember the two tomato picking droids from the August edition, AI#1 and AI#2.  They have asked me to include their easy green tomato chutney recipe, so here goes,

750g firm green tomatoes, chopped 150g cooking apples, chopped 150ml white wine or cider vinegar 150g onion, finely chopped 100g light muscovado sugar 75g sultanas

Ginger to taste, e.g., 2cm root ginger peeled and finely grated or a good squirt of ginger paste 1 clove of garlic, peeled and finely chopped or a good squirt of garlic paste 1 hot red chilli, (2 or 3 if you’re feeling brave) finely chopped with seeds included

Heat the sugar in a pan until caramelised then add all other ingredients and bring to the boil, reduce heat and simmer for 1 hour.  Taste a cooled spoon full after 40 mins so that you can adjust the flavour if needed i.e. more ginger, chilli, sugar, gin, not gin, forget the gin. The chutney is ready when you can draw a wooden spoon across the bottom of the pan so that it leaves a clear channel that doesn’t immediately fill with chutney. Fill into preheated jars and seal.

Keep gardening, Richard Haigh EGRGA Communications