Test the soil for lime content if this was not done earlier and add lime if it is below pH 6.5. Clear away rubbish from around the stems of plants and ensure that stakes and ties are secure.
Order plants for spring planting in outdoor beds and for greenhouse cultivation. Prepare beds, first testing the drainage if the land tends to be wet.
Under glass
Maintain a temperature of 7ºC (45ºF) for perpetual flowering carnations and give some ventilation at all times.
  Water and feed sparingly, cutting blooms and disbudding flower stems as necessary.
Watch for carnation rust and aphids, using dusts in preference to sprays during the winter.
  Continue to propagate perpetual flowering carnations by cutting and pot up rooted cuttings. When the roots of young plants reach the sides of the 2 or 2½ in. pots, pot on into 3½in. pots, using John Innes potting compost No.1.
Stop plants. Give the plants their first stopping when they have made nine or ten pairs of fully developed leaves. Hold the stem firmly with your finger and thumb at the seventh joint and bend the top of the plant sideways with the other hand to break off the tip. if the top does not snap off cut it just above the seventh joint.
  Continue to sow seeds of perpetual flowering and annual carnations and prick them out when ready.