Choose new fruit trees

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The coldest month is often a quiet one in the garden, but there are plenty of ways to keep busy. January is the ideal time for planting pansies, primulas (garden centres should be well stocked) and hardy perennials.
Planting fruit trees can be done (avoiding days when there is heavy frost) and you can prune your existing apple and pear trees and others bearing seeded fruit, especially ones trained espalier-style up a flat surface such as a wall or fence (again, avoiding very frosty days).
This is also a good time to fertilise your trees, with manure or compost and scatter ash, which gives nutrients to the roots. Brush trunks with a stiff brush to get rid of parasites and treat them with paraffin oil. Get rid of lichen, which is often infested with insects.
If choosing a new fruit tree, make sure the variety is well suited to your soil and climate. This applies to the rootstock as well as to the actual fruiting species grafted on to it. Make sure you know what size it will end up as and whether or not it is self-fertilising. Many fruit trees need to receive pollen from a tree of another variety to be fertilised.
Fruit trees come either in containers or with bare roots. Choose scions (a branch grafted on less than a year ago) or ones aged two or three years old (when there should be around four or five well formed branches).
Choose a sunny, sheltered position and dig the hole two or three weeks beforehand. It should be as deep as it is wide and a third wider than the roots. Separate the topsoil (which should be put at the bottom of the hole).
Cut the ends off the largest roots and soak the roots before planting with a bought solution called pralin or just water mixed with mud and compost.
You can train it espalier-style up a south-facing wall. Otherwise, young trees need a support stake, pushed into the hole before planting. The place where the tree was grafted on to the rootstock should be at ground level.
Plant the tree and fill the hole with soil mixed with manure. Shake the roots as you fill to avoid pockets of air. Attach the tree lightly to its stake and water well.
This is also a good time to clean your gardening tools. Get rid of soil and use a metallic brush to remove rust. Rub them with a damp cloth, then oil with linseed oil or changed oil from your lawnmower. You should give wood handles a rub with a fine sandpaper and then treat them with linseed oil.