In the meantime I thought, while I was waiting for seed germination to occur and the frosts to stop their sneak attacks, I would turn over a bit of that bare, barren soil.
I went out, garden fork in hand and ... couldn't find it for weeds! I had glanced away momentarily, spring had sprung and my garden had sprouted a better crop of grass than my paddock ever had. I put away my garden fork and reached for heavier artillery. The weed sprayer.
I have a love hate relationship with my weed sprayer. I am such a bad gardener that this piece of equipment is all that stands between me and a garden so thick with mallow, grass and cleavers that it takes a search team with bloodhounds and machetes to find and rescue me.
On the other hand my weed sprayer is heavy, needs to be pumped manually every three strides or it goes from a sprayer to a dribbler, and it leaks. A week or so after I have decimated my weed-forest with the sprayer you can see my meandering path from garden to garden, marked out on the lawn by leaky toxic drips.
There's where I wandered over to spray round the kowhai tree. There's where I spotted a grandchild's discarded gumboot and went to pick it up, leaking sprayer in tow, before heading over to the rose bush...
The sprayer's penchant for going from spray to dribble also goes the other way - one minute I'm delicately squirting a patch of oxalis next to the blackcurrant bush, then suddenly the sprayer turns rogue, doing an imitation of a lawn sprinkler and dousing everything in sight.
That's when I have to run for the garden hose and, apologising profusely, apply running water to all the unfairly-sprayed plantings.
Sometimes I just give up, having accidentally soaked a patch of pansies or marigolds in weed-killer, and just make a mental note to buy some new ones.
Sad, really, since pansies and marigolds are, apart from weeds, the only things I can really manage to grow.
Even in my vege garden I struggle with producing much more than a few cabbages to attract the butterflies, some stumpy carrots that I pull up, peer at and then consign to the horses, and my goat-attracting silverbeet.
This year, however, I have a secret weapon.
Over the winter, quietly sprouting in a dark pantry cupboard, I have two choko plants.
They were passed on to me by someone who assures me his plants are hardy, prolific and inclined to take over the entire garden with very little encouragement.
So far this looks to be true. With no encouragement from me whatsoever, the two green spiky choko I was handed in autumn, with instructions to put them in a safe, dark place, have sprouted long green tentacles and taken over the pantry cupboard in a slightly scary manner.
They like the sun, I am told. They also like to climb and they spread like wildfire.
The most climbable and sunny spot is on a north-facing fence. I think the choko might like it there.
I hope they don't get too carried away though as the neighbours on that side are readying their garden for a summer wedding and I don't think they have invited my choko plants.
It's OK though, if it comes to the worst, I can loan them my sprayer.