Things to do in the JANUARY garden

• Before purchasing seeds, take an INVENTORY OF SEEDS left from last year. Onion, leek, parsnip, corn, larkspur, geranium and salvia seeds are short-term keepers that should be kept for just one year -- that is, for planting a second year only.

• Try SOMETHING NEW this year. Scan seed racks and catalogue pages, and select a flower or vegetable you've not grown before.

• Early in January I watch for a few days of mild, dry weather to apply a second DORMANT SPRAY OF LIME SULPHUR to the fruit trees and roses. Lime sulphur can be used on deciduous ornamental and fruiting trees and shrubs of most kinds except for apricot, filbert, Japanese plum and blueberry, which are injured by sulphur.

• Check the SOIL MOISTURE UNDERNEATH HOUSE EAVES where there are plants growing, and water as needed. Plants such as camellias, if allowed to dry at the roots, will dry or drop their flowerbuds.

• If a SNOWFALL occurs, knock accumulated snow from shrubs and hedges to avoid broken branches from the snow's weight. Leave snow on winter vegetable plots and perennial beds, for it offers the plants some insulation against the cold.

• Use pleasant January days to do OUTDOOR REPAIRS, for example, on fences and gates, or to work on garden construction projects such as a new patio floor, a cold frame, or a trellis.

• PLAN FLOWER AND VEGETABLE PLOTS as you organize seed purchases. Shift the different blocks of vegetables -- the roots, the peas and beans, the cabbage family -- away from their locations of last year. Change the annual flower plantings in each area from year to year as well.

• Brighten a sheltered doorway with a PLANTER BOX OR PATIO POT filled with pansies, primulas, and early flowerbulbs that have been purchased in pots or dug carefully from the garden.

• Gather and prepare supplies for INDOOR SEEDING.

• Start lettuce seeds indoors for plants to set out in frames or under plastic tunneling next month.