Late Autumn

Autumn and Winter in the Garden.

Hints & Tips for your Garden in Autumn and Winter.

Keep raking up leaves from borders and lawns. Bag them up into black bin liners and tie the tops up. Make a few small air holes in the bag to help them break down to lovely compost naturally. Alternatively just add them to your compost bin or heap. Make sure that they are mixed in with other prunings, vegetable waste and grass cuttings in the compost heap. All material should be cut up small or use a shredder if you have access to one. It may be an idea to club together with your neighbours to buy one to share.
Keep deadheading autumn flowering perennials until they are cut back by the first frosts. Do not cut “Penstemmon” plants back too far as this may reduce protection for the plant over the colder weather to come. Remove dead seed heads if you do not wish to have them over winter for their structure. Particularly efficient seeding plants such as alchemilla mollis, fennel, golden rod should be deadheaded as soon as the flowers are over or they will spread everywhere.
Don't let your precious container plants drown! If you expect flooding move pots and containers to higher ground. Pots standing in saucers full of water are likely to cause the plant roots to rot. Freezing will either crack the saucers, pots or kill the plant. The combination of waterlogged roots and cold weather can be fatal. Plants in containers are much more susceptible than plants in the ground.
Plants in small containers can freeze solid. Plants in small containers are particularly prone to freezing solid in prolonged periods of frost; sinking the pot/container in the ground, or ashes helps avoid this problem. An alternative for large containers is to lag, or move under cover.
Stay indoors if your garden is so wet that the ground squelches. Keep off the ground. There is nothing much you can do and a limited period under water will not hurt most plants. In fact, many trees and plants will benefit from the extra moisture in the following seasons.
Put back nutrients. Flooding and excessive rainfall can leach nutrients out of the soil. Feed and protect plants by mulching with homemade compost and bark. Use a general granular slow release fertiliser applied at the rate of a small handful per square metre, or as directed.
Spike the lawn and grass areas and get some exercise at the same time. If you have a large lawn area hire an aerator and remove the plugs to the compost bin. After prolonged rainfall, if you feel energetic, it can help to 'spike' the ground with a digging fork. This will help compensate for the compaction that can occur, let air into the ground and assist drainage. It is also a good time to apply coarse grit sand and brush it into the holes made along with fine compost feed. Try to keep off the ground while it is still wet or you may do more harm than good.
Using a timber plank to stand on will help to protect the lawn if you are weeding or working on a flower border. It can be better to use planks to push barrows over soft areas to save forming ruts. I find that using a large expandable purpose-made canvas bag or tarpaulin sheet to carry light cuttings easy when slung over one shoulder in manageable loads.
Wisterias can have a final pruning now to remove wispy tendrils and reduce any excessive growth. It is also a good time to set up new supporting wires and to tie-in branches to avoid wind damage.
Protect new growth from frost. Frost is most damaging when it follows a period of unseasonable warmth. The newly encouraged growth will suffer unless protected. Horticultural fleece and bark or compost as a mulch will help protect susceptible plants. Some delicate dry climate plants should be protected from excessive rain on their crowns. They may also be wrapped in hessian or horticultural fleece to protect them from severe wind chill in exposed areas.
Hose off frost. Frost can be washed off tender subjects with a gentle spray from your hosepipe or watering can. Do it before the sun hits, but make sure it is not still freezing hard.
Avoid frost-damaged blooms. Make sure that Camellias, Rhododendrons, Azaleas and similar subjects in containers, are moved away from the early morning sun. This will avoid those frost-damaged blooms. They generally prefer areas of light shade to grow in anyway.
Prepare for winter. Most container-grown plants hate being wet and cold. Young plants in particular often die in these conditions. Keep the plant fairly dry in the winter and protect the pots during the coldest weather.
Don’t let Bamboo plants dry out in the winter. Because they have a large leaf area, Bamboo can dry out, particularly in windy, dry winter weather. The tell tale sign is leaf curl. If it occurs the Bamboo needs a good drink but don’t leave the plant sitting in water.
Even in cold but dry spells do not allow newly planted trees or hedges such as yew or box to dry out. However do be mindful of your soil type. In clay areas, tree roots can easily become waterlogged and rot away. This will kill your precious (and expensive) plants. Try to create a means for excess water to escape by forming a narrow slit in the soil, on the downhill side of any planting hole and trickling 4 – 6mm pea gravel and sharp grit into it to form a slight drainage way.