Tips for Gardening This Fall

While things are winding down in the fall, there are still some gardening tips and strategies that you can employ. You can add some color and life to your garden, and prepare it for winter. Depending on where you live, fall can be a busy time in the garden. Here are some tips.

Color

Fall is a colorful season, and you can add some of that color to your garden this time of year. Chrysanthemums (mums) come in a variety of yellows, bronzes, reds, and purples. Fall is the time to plant these and take advantage of the season’s colors. It’s worth noting, however, that mums will return each year – they’re perennials. So take that into consideration as you decide on their placement in your garden.

Get the Weeds before They Seed

Fall is the time when many weeds go to seed, sending the makings of next year’s invasion all over your yard. Thankfully, fall can be a rainy time, and wet soil is easier to pull or hoe weeds out of than dry soil. You’ll thank yourself next spring when the weeds are fewer.

Another word about weed control in the fall – you can lay down several layers of newspaper on your garden once the plants are spent. Anchor the newspapers with rocks or soil and, by the time spring arrives, the weeds will have been deprived of the light and air they need to sprout. The newspaper will decompose and can be tilled into the soil to enrich it, and another layer applied in the spring before planting (poke holes in the newspaper layer to plant).

Pests’ Hiding Places

Remove the dead leaves and spent plants from your garden before winter sets in. Many invasive and annoying pests overwinter beneath leaves, boards, tools, and anything else left lying on the ground.

However, some gardeners like to leave a layer of autumn leaves on their garden to act as a mulch and compost in one. So depending on what kind of pests you have in your area and how cold it gets, leaving the leaves may work for you.

Plant Bulbs

There are a variety of bulbs that need to be planted in the fall. If you grow garlic, it will need to be put into the garden in the fall. Flowers like hyacinths and daffodils are typically planted in the fall so they can complete their growth cycle in time to come up in spring.

Trees and Shrubs

Now is a good time to prune back trees and shrubs, including shrub roses. It’s also a good time to plant them. In the fall, trees and shrubs are in a dormant state, and the planting and pruning are less shocking to the plant.