These 8 Fall Gardening tasks need to be done before the really cold weather settles in! Get them done now and your garden will be ahead of the game next spring!
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8 Fall Gardening Tasks
Fall is the time to get your garden ready for spring planting. If you tackle a few important 8 fall gardening tasks now in mid-fall then your spring gardening will be so much easier. So here’s a quick list of those last-minute items you should take care of before winter sets in!
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1. Be sure to tear out all of your dead, dying or spent plants.
This seems pretty basic but a lot of people get busy this time of year and never get around to pulling out all those old tomato plants or corn stalks. Good hygiene is an important part of a successful garden. Leaving old plants all winter in your garden gives lots of pests great places to hide. Slugs and snails especially are looking for a nice warm spot to spend the winter, don’t give them somewhere to hide. Many other pests will overwinter in plants left in the garden. Be sure you either dispose of all this seasons’ plants or even better compost them!
2. Be especially careful to get rid of any diseased plant material.
Tomato plants with sick leaves, that kale plant that is just covered in aphids, or those squash vines covered in powdery mildew. All of these types of plants should be thrown out NOT composted. Many of those types of diseases are carried in the soil. If you compost those plants the problems will just be transferred to other parts of your garden. Also, be sure to completely clean up any loose leaves from diseased plants and get them away from your garden beds. It’s also a good idea to do one last good weeding to get rid of any perennial weeds that might make it through the winter.
3. Do any tilling or turning of your beds now!
If your beds need a tiller run through them or if you just need to turn the soil with a digging fork
, fall is the best time to get that done. In the fall your soil is usually nice and dry and easy to work so do all of your tilling now. Then when spring comes you won’t have to wait for the soil to dry before you can plant. All your beds will need is a quick work over with a rake
and they will be ready for your spring peas, lettuce, and Cole crops!
4. Add compost
No matter what your soil type, it needs more organic matter. A good quality organic compost will improve almost any soil type. And this time of year most of the nurseries and even the big box stores are trying to get rid of the left over’s. So compost can often be bought at a big discount. Try adding an inch or two of compost to all your beds before you till them or turn the soil. Your plants will thank you next spring!!
5. Rougher organic materials
If you are planning on adding grass clippings or leaves to your garden, fall is the best time to do that as well. It takes longer for these rougher materials to break down in the soil. While they are breaking down the bacteria doing all the work takes up nitrogen from the soil robbing your plants. Till these rougher items into your garden in the fall and they will have all winter and early spring to break down and improve the soil before you start planting in the spring.
6. Drain Hoses and Water systems
Be sure to drain any garden hoses that you have been using all summer. Simply lay them out flat and then pick the hose up and walk along hand over hand with the hose above your head. This will force all the water out the other end. If you have drip systems or underground sprinklers in your garden, be sure they are all drained and winterized as well. Also, be sure to disconnect hoses from the hose bibs or they will cause the pipes to burst in your house if they freeze!!
7. Bring in all pots, decorations, and movable structures
Winter weather is very rough on clay and plastic pots. Stack them together and store them in a garage or shed. If you don’t have that option then put them in a protected corner and cover them with a tarp! Tomato cages, trellises, and other garden structures should also be put in a protected space. This will make them last a lot longer. Also, don’t forget your garden gnomes and other knick-knacks, their paint will last many more years if they spend the winter indoors!
8. Sweep for garden pests
The last of the fall gardening tasks is a good sweep of your garden looking for hidden pests. As winter really gets closer spend some time in the cold part of the day searching your garden for hidden pests. Look for slugs, snails, earwigs, and other critters and try to root them out of their hiding spots and destroy them. The more of those little guys you get rid of this fall the fewer of their babies you will have to deal with next summer!
I know you may be a little tired of gardening right now but trust me you will be happy next spring that you spent some time doing these fall gardening task to clean up and prep your garden.
What fall gardening tasks do you prefer to do now? Did I miss any?
Dealing with fall leaves – Making Leaf Mold
I would love to turn our soil over now, but it’s just too wet. We have had 2 inches of rain in the last week. I’m hoping it will dry out enough to add compost and till it in.
Thanks for sharing your fall gardening tasks on the Tuesday Garden Party!
Thanks for your tips. We don’t disc in the fall here in the deep south, or at least on our farm. We put the chickens in the garden over winter and they do it for us while they fertilize. We both benefit and they don’t know it’s work! LOL Thanks again for reminding us it’s time to get ready.
I confess that I do put the powdery mildew leaves into the compost. It is such an endemic problem here that you can’t get away from it. Even the raked leaves from the trees have it and without those I’d be without any brown matter for my compost. And interestingly enough I don’t find it makes the problem worse. Those spores are everywhere anyway. If the plant is going to get it, it will. Most other diseases I’ll get rid of or dig into the soil where the plants grew and rotate well.
I’ve always been taught that if the plants are sick at all then you shouldn’t compost them. That may be a bit of an overreaction but its a policy I’ve always tried to follow. Wow I can’t imagine even your trees having powdery mildew. We are lucky here in Utah (or maybe we are not lucky) to have very dry summers so most of the mildew problems with plants don’t start until very late in the year and almost never effect our harvests.
I am pinning this.
I did have powdery mildew hit my squash. I was able to harvest alot of my spaghetti squash, though only got 2 butternut, whose leaves were the first hit. Now I am getting ready to clean it all up. This was a new spot we cleared out, a tree mound just behind our sitting area. It was perfect for the trailing squash. I am hoping I can still use it next year. Knowing that the mildew spores will still be in the soil, is there something I can do to kill them before next spring. One site suggested clear plastic to heat up the soil. It is now fall and I doubt we will see many more warm days in Western Washington state. Thanks!
I’m not sure if there is science backing covering with plastic BUT It couldn’t hurt and would also help your weed issues (if you have any) in that area. If you have cleared that spot out go ahead and get some plastic down. You would be amazed by how quickly things can heat up with even fall levels of sunlight. Just leave it on for a week or so. But keep your expectations low. Powdery mildew is a hard one to defeat.
I had a bad problem with mildew on delicata and the zucchini, both planted in the same 2′ x 4′ raised container bed. Should I dump all the soil out of this bed and start with new soil come spring? Or is there a way to treat the soil to make it reusable?
I hate to see you dump all that soil, but it can be soil bourne. Is there away to rotate all of your squash family plants away from that bed for about 3 or 4 years? That would help.
I’ve been reading a lot of scientific, evidence-based (as well as anecdotal) information on no-till growing. Seems it’s gaining popularity among both professional market gardeners and home gardeners. I’ve been experimenting with it for four years now and am getting impressive results with very few weeds. Reducing soil disturbance increases beneficial microbial life, conserves soil moisture, reduces weeds, and it’s a lot less work overall. In the fall I spread 1-2 inches of compost over the beds and cover with a thick mulch of autumn leaves. In the spring I remove and compost the leaf mulch and loosen the soil gently with a garden fork (without turning it). Then I plant seeds right into the compost. For transplants, I push the leaf mulch aside for each planting hole, put in the plants, let the soil warm up for a few days, then push the leaf mulch close to the stems. The earthworms seem very happy with this practice too.
Thanks, Rick, for the helpful tips! I’ve already started cleaning up and adding compost to few of my beds like you said. I’ll do more this week. 🙂
Great info! I wish I had seen earlier where to leave the bean plant roots in the ground for the nitrogen. It was too late for me this year since I yanked them up already and in the compost they went. But next year I will leave them. I did a cleanup and still have collards and some kale growing so they are the last so far. I too, turned the chickens loose in there hoping they get a head start on the bugs for next year. I think I’ll rake some leaves over the beds for the winter and maybe put cardboard over it all. Thanks for the tips and looking forward to learning more.