Putting The Garden To Bed
It’s time to start putting the garden to bed and to start cleaning up what is left. In today’s blog post we will be giving you some tips and pointers on how you can start packing up.
Why should you prep your garden for the winter?
Well its as simple as you won’t have as much work to do in the spring. Cleaning up debris, scouting for pests and disease, and suppressing weeds will mean that there will be less tasks to complete when spring starts to come back around.
There are several steps to getting your garden ready for the winter: cutting back, cleaning up, saving plants, protecting, and weeding. Do not feel as though you have to do everything at once. Baby steps help in the long run, and you will be amazed by how much you actually got done.
Right now our cooler weather makes the an ideal season to spend some time in the garden. Plus you can start to settle in for winter knowing that when you look out the window, your garden is all tucked in!
Where Do You Start?
If you have had a bad pest or disease problem, focus there. If you have been meaning to do something about your soil, take advantage of this calm season to get it done. And if you have a lot of tender new plants, you should focus on making sure they are protected.
1. Cutting Back
Start by cutting back your perennials, although you may want to wait until a frost has caused the plants to dieback. You want to be careful of not to encourage new growth that will be hit again. Start with plants that were diseased or had a pest problem and dispose of that debris, do not compost it.(Do not prune woody plants, trees, and shrubs until they are dormant.)
2. Cleaning Up
Pull dead or declining annuals.Yes this is hard to do, but they are not going to come back in the spring so best do it now vs later.
Harvest everything above ground (vegetable garden and under fruit trees) Do not leave fruits and vegetables out all winter to rot, it will attract animals and set seed.
Clean up overgrown areas, to prevent animals and pests moving in. Tackle any messy areas around the garden, you will thank us later.
Clean and store stakes, cages, and garden ornaments. They will last longer if you do not leave them exposed for the winter.
3. Save The Plants
Ironically, there is still planting in the fall. Make sure to dig up any flowering bulbs, garlic, and rhubarb in the ground, before it freezes. You can store those for next year.
We get asked a lot of what to do with still alive and blooming containers. If your plants are still looking good bring them indoors. This also goes for any herbs. Make sure to store them where they will have light and a warm place so that they do not go into shock. You will want to maintain any watering and feeding as per usual.
4. Protect
Here in Central Oregon all of us struggle with the Deer. A way you can work around this in the winter is to shield the plants. Put small fencing around shrubs. Use tree guards for trees. Another great trick is to add mound soil or mulch around the base of grafted roses.
*Remember to remove it in the spring.
5. Pull Those Weeds
If there is only one take away, that would be to weed your garden now, especially Perennial weeds . Pulling those weeds now, this will create a more of a struggle for the weeds to fill back in and will reduce the problems for your garden in the spring.