Order the year's seeds, onion sets and seed potatoes, or visit Dundry Nurseries during their spud weekend.

Map your plot adopting a three or four year rotation plan using the Vegetable Planner as a guide.

Start off garlic and shallots in pots and begin chitting potatoes inside a greenhouse or coldframe.

If you have a heated greenhouse, you can sow sweet peas and French beans inside in pots or a propagator.

Apply a potash dressing to the roots of strawberries, gooseberries and currant plants, taking care to avoid the leaves, as this will cause scorching.

If you have overwintering vegetables under cloches or fleece, don't forget to ventilate and allow plenty of fresh air to get in on sunny days. Under glass the January sun can push temperatures as high as on a hot summer's day.

Pack some straw or fleece around celery to protect it from frost damage but remove it on sunny days to let the plants breathe.

Draw the soil up around the stalks of cabbages and winter cauliflowers to just under the first set of leaves. If not already protected, support Brussels sprouts and sprouting broccoli, to prevent toppling in high winds.

Take advantage of days when the soil is frozen hard to barrow and stack manure and compost close to where it will be dug in later on. Don't walk on the soil as it begins to thaw it will be wet and sticky.

If you have any plants or seedlings ticking over in a cold greenhouse cover them with several layers of newspaper on frosty nights but remove it on warm days.

Dig up rhubarb roots and divide them leaving the sections on the surface of the soil for a few days to frost prior to forcing. Cover any crowns in the soil that have been set aside for forcing with an upturned bucket or flower pot and cover the drainage holes to shut out the light. With luck you will be harvesting pale pink sticks by late February.

Check on any fruit and vegetables in store and remove any that are diseased or soft.

Towards the end of the month when the weather and soil conditions allow, plant soft fruit bushes. Spray all fruit trees and bushes with a garlic winter wash on a fine day; do not spray in frosty conditions. It won't hurt to hold the job over to next month.

Seed potatoes will available during the month. Buy or order and collect egg trays to chit them in. On days when you can't work on the plot clean the shed, greenhouse, greenhouse glass, tools and linseed oil wooden handles. Wash pots and seed trays with a weak solution of household bleach or detergent, and rinse. Check watering cans and buckets for holes and that the wheelbarrow doesn't have a flat tyre.

Prune dormant fruit trees such as apples and pears, and prune soft fruit bushes if not done already.

Old bags of compost deteriorate over time so use up by spreading as a soil improver.