Post by Pam on Oct 4, 2009 13:38:32 GMT -5
Winterizing the Landscape in Fall
Tips for Fall Lawn Care, Winterizing Gardens
By David Beaulieu, About.com
There are a number of serious fall chores for the landscaper to complete before winter in order to ready the landscape for the next growing season. Let's take a look at some of the required chores, breaking them down by landscaping category.
Fall Lawn Care:
Winterizing Annual beds:
Winterizing Trees and Shrubs:
----------------------------------------------
For more tips go to: David Beaulieu, About.com
Tips for Fall Lawn Care, Winterizing Gardens
By David Beaulieu, About.com
There are a number of serious fall chores for the landscaper to complete before winter in order to ready the landscape for the next growing season. Let's take a look at some of the required chores, breaking them down by landscaping category.
Fall Lawn Care:
- Apply herbicides to broadleaf weeds.
- Correct pH. If a soil test should show a need to reduce acidity, apply lime now. If alkalinity needs to be reduced, apply sulphur.
- Thatch removal: dethatch your lawn, by raking; for bad cases of soil compaction, you may have to employ the technique known as core aeration.
- Rake leaves, lest the leaves smother your grass over the winter. To maximize your landscaping efficiency when raking leaves, consult Fall Cleanup: Make Mulch and Compost With the Leaves That You Rake .
- Lawn mower care: make sure to drain old gas after last mowing.
- Overseeding:
[1] Overseeding Lawns With Cool-Season Grasses
[2] Overseeding Lawns With Warm-Season Grasses - Note: You should already have applied fertilizer to cool season grasses early in the fall. Since these grasses often grow most vigorously during periods of moderate weather (not too hot, not too cold), it is precisely at this time that they can best use the nutrients provided by a fertilizer. Fertilization helps the lawn recover from the summer heat and prepares it for the next growing season.
Winterizing Annual beds:
- After harvesting your fruits and flowers, remove old plant matter from the garden, placing it in your compost bin. Leaving it behind in the garden would invite plant diseases next growing season.
- Rototill your garden soil. Rototilling now may seem premature; but it will make your spring rototilling work go much easier. Make a habit of rototilling each year both in the fall and in the spring. Drain the old gas out of the rototiller afterwards.
- If you are going to rototill, this is the time to apply lime (if soil tests have indicated that your pH is too low). The effects of liming don't manifest themselves for several months, so liming in the spring is too late for next year's crop.
- Protect your topsoil from the rigors of winter. You have two options here:
[1] You can plant a cover crop for large beds.
[2] Or you can apply a mulch. Mulching is more efficient for smaller beds. And landscapers have a ready source of mulch in the leaves that they rake. - Some garden experts recommend spreading compost on the soil as well at this time. I personally disagree with this strategy, feeling that it is a waste of compost. I recommend keeping your compost protected in a compost bin during the winter, waiting until planting season to spread it in the garden.
Winterizing Trees and Shrubs:
- Winterize small deciduous shrubs that have fragile branches with a lean-to or some other sort of structure to keep heavy snows off their limbs. Deciduous shrubs provide no interest in winter anyways, so you are not losing anything visually by covering them. Evergreens, by contrast, are the cornerstone of winter landscaping aesthetics.
- To a great degree winterizing trees and larger shrubs can be achieved simply by watering them properly in the fall, since the winter damage that they sustain often stems from their inability to draw water from the frozen earth. "Avoid watering trees in late summer or early fall before the leaves fall so they can 'harden off' for winter," states Sherry Lajeunesse, in a Montana State University Extension article. "Then in late fall, after deciduous trees drop their leaves but before the ground freezes, give both evergreen and deciduous trees and shrubs a final deep watering to last them through the winter." The same source also reminds us to "water under the entire canopy area and beyond," to cover the entire root area.
----------------------------------------------
For more tips go to: David Beaulieu, About.com