Winterize Your Garden

Here are a some tips on how to winterize your garden and help your plants and wildlife live and thrive through the following year into spring and summer:

I recommend a 1 inch layer of leafgro and 2 inch layer of pine fines (first choice) or double shredded hardwood mulch once each year. If you haven’t applied them for the year yet then I would weed and edge the garden bed, apply your leafgro and mulch and the reapply next fall!

An example of pine fine mulch, with dimes for scale.

You can cut back all perennials to the ground once they die in the frost (they’ll be completely brown) but I actually recommend waiting to cut back until the spring. If you wait until spring then the birds like the seeds from the plants throughout the winter. Also, it allows the plants to drop their seed so new ones grow next spring. The dead perennial tops also create protection for wildlife in the winter and early spring.

I would recommend blowing your leaves into the bed and letting them sit until spring. The beneficial insects overwinter in the leaves and will have a chance to hatch next year on your property if you don’t bag the leaves and send them off! Also, the leaves provide valuable fertilizer/compost as they break down. Leaves used as fertilizer or compost for your plants also discourage weed growth.

If you have an installed water feature, such as small ponds or waterfalls that have water pumps, it is important to make sure that the piping does not freeze.

Winter is also a great time to clean your tools and make sure they are in proper working condition.

Pruning is my winter garden task of choice. It’s a great time to get in there and restore a shrub and prune trees.