Too cold outside? Look for indoor garden tasks

I nearly fell in my driveway this morning as I walked out in the dark to pick up my newspapers.

With the recent warm weather, I was expecting the drive to be clear, but there was a small pile of slush (about 6 inches in diameter) that was compacted and melting and very slippery. Today’s lessons: be more careful; and use warm spells to get out and shovel off snow and ice left on walks.

The cold winter days are a good time to do some garden administrative tasks.

I plan to organize my garage once there is weekend day with warm weather.

Check on the seeds you have saved and stored from last summer’s garden. Discard anything that is damp, diseased or moldy and then determine what you need to order for the coming year.

Order plants and seeds now to help ensure the availability of plant varieties you would like to purchase. Consider varieties that are pest- and disease-resistant to minimize future problems in the garden.

Inspect squash, potatoes, root crops and other vegetables and fruits that you have in winter storage. Although conditions may have been ideal when you harvested and stored them in the fall, winter weather may have made it too cold or damp. Vegetables stored in an unheated garage may freeze in very cold winter weather and should be moved to a basement or other area where they may be kept as cool as possible.

We lost potatoes one year after leaving them in the garage during an extended bitter cold streak and they froze. Throw away or compost anything that has spoiled or has soft spots. The same goes for summer flower bulbs like dahlias and gladioli that you saved to plant next spring.

Paperwhite narcissus require a cage or a ring of raffia tied around them to keep them from flopping as they grow. If purchased as bulbs, they may be grown in a shallow dish or a vase filled with pebbles rather than soil.

Put about 2 inches of pebbles in the bottom of a small vase or about 4 inches in a large vase. Arrange the bulbs close together and cover them with pebbles, with just their tips exposed. The weight of the pebbles helps keep them from falling to the side as they grow.

Finally, add water until the level reaches just below the base of the bulbs, but no higher (if the bases of the bulbs sit in water, they will rot). Discard the bulbs after flowering, but rinse and keep the pebbles for future forced bulbs.

• Tim Johnson is director of horticulture at Chicago Botanic Garden, chicagobotanic.org.