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December 03, 2024

This Week's Garden Gab:
​Managing Your Winter Garden

Hi Reader!

It seems there should be little to do in the garden during the late fall and winter months, however, in a thriving garden there is always something that will need your attention. Granted, you will likely not break a sweat like a hot summer day but the winter garden does require some effort to keep things beautiful, functioning and fun to enjoy.

In this edition:

• What is a winter garden
• 3 Things to do in a winter garden
• Benefits of a garden cleanup

Education:

The summer garden is a beautiful thing. Plants thrive, the sun shines, and birds fly high in crisp blue skies.

The winter garden also has its fun times... just in a different way. The winter garden requires less daily attention. Unless you are in Zone 9 or higher, you probably won't need to do much at all, if anything. With that said, there are some things that you can do to help your garden through colder temperatures.

What is a Winter Garden?

Gardening is usually associated with summer flower or vegetables gardens.

The usual summer fare includes Cucurbit family (cucumbers, squash, and melons), tomatoes, peppers, beans, peas and corn. These are fun to grow, however, they do not grow well in cool temperatures.

Once the temperature drops, you can either close down the garden until Spring, or you can grow cool weather veggies such as those in the Brassica family (also called cruciferous vegetables) which includes, turnips, collards, cabbage, rutabagas, broccoli and Brussel sprouts.

This is what I am growing currently...

Action:

If you decide to grow winter veggies you'll still need to do the basics like water, feed, and do pest control, but what if you decide not to grow anything? Is there anything that you can or should do in your garden/yard?

Yes! Yes! and Yes!

1. Clean your garden grounds. If you have a small patio garden or a sizeable backyard, it's time to pick up the area. Pick up sticks, weed areas around your structures or beds, and mow or trim tall grasses. Clean up any areas where trash, old tools, open bags of soil, etc. might be laying around. This will keep critters and insects from overwintering in your garden and it will make your area more pleasing to the eye even though there will be no food growing.

Remember your garden is for food but it an also be your little DIY sanctuary.

If you have a patio area, you can still go sit out on a cold evening all wrapped up with a mug of hot chocolate and enjoy your space with family or friends.

2. Protect overwintering plants. I have a few small citrus trees in large grow bags that are now too large for me to store inside so I needed to figure out a plan for the trees when the nights dip below freezing. This is what I came up with.

We had one low 40s night recently where I tested it and I think it's going to work like a charm.

Basically, I made an arched structure using Ladder Mesh and then draped a clear tarp over it pinning it to the structure to hold it in place. You have to remember to remove the plastic tarp in the morning or pull it back because once the sun comes out your DIY greenhouse will heat up very quickly and .... bye-bye plants!

As soon as I lifted up the tarp I felt a wave of heat! It was amazing how warm it was in there when it was only mid-40s outside. The citrus plants loved it.

If you do this though, be sure to remove the plastic when the sun rises because it will get TOO hot under the plastic and kill your plants.

3. Set a plan and design for the upcoming season. Once your are finished with summer gardening you have a few weeks to reflect and think about what you'd like to do in the next season.

I like to make sketches of my garden and envision tables, grow bags, structures in different places just so create a new look. My sketches are nothing fancy. It just helps me to 'see' the layout in my mind better.

4. Collect and clean your tools. By the end of the season, my tools are pretty beat up. After I find all my tools around the yard (trowels, pruners, rakes, shovels, etc.) I start cleaning and sharpening them.

I sharpen the blades with a sharpening tool, and I smooth wooden handles on my rakes to keep splinters at bay using a piece of course sandpaper. Then, I oil any hinges and springs with WD-40 or some other lubricant.

5. Make Leaf Mold (Mulch). I'm not sure why it's called 'mold' because we certainly are NOT dealing with black mold but rather, leaf mold, which is simply the compost produced by decomposition of shaded deciduous shrub and tree leaves, primarily by fungal breakdown in a slower, cooler manner as opposed to the bacterial degradation of leaves in a compost bin.

If you have a ton of leaves in your yard or neighborhood don't throw them out.

​Learn about all the nutrients that are in fall leaves here. 🍂

Fall Leaves are a significant source of nutrients such as Carbon, Nitrogen, Phosphorous, and Potassium. As leaves decompose via microbes or worms, these essential nutrients are released into the soil.

There are several ways to start a leaf compost pile.

Read more here: How to Make and Use Leaf Mold​

I use a GeoBin pictured below. It's the perfect set up for me. You can see I hammered rebar into the ground to support it because my yard is sloped but on a flat surface you shouldn't need to do this.

I just fill it up with double shredded leaves from all over the yard and let it decompose. Also, if I need mulch for my containers, I can grab some of the top.

Summation:

Of course, you don't have to do anything at all in your winter garden. It will likely survive, you'll just have more work to do in the Spring and you might lose some things that might have otherwise survived with a little attention.

Not cleaning up your areas and leaving open bags of soil, mulch, etc. laying around could invite snakes, mice, and other creatures in the spring as you wake up your garden and prepare to plant.

Not protecting plants from cold weather and winds could literally kill your plants, especially if they are in containers. You don't have to build a structure, you can simply cover it with frost cloth. Usually plants growing in the ground will do much better because the roots are protected in the soil that has a more steady temperature throughout the winter but, trust me a good cold snap will kill your container plants.

Edification: Something to Ponder

Not a week goes by when I don't think about the Garden of Eden while tending to my little plot of land. There is always something to tend to in my garden, whether it be sowing, weeding, cleaning, protecting, de'bug'ging or harvesting. I often wonder how much work was needed in the Garden of Eden. I like to think it was perfect! No work to do; just waiting for the fruit to ripen and picking it. NO bugs to fight with.

But... the Book of Genesis says that God put man in the garden to "work the ground and care for it." Looks like Adam and Eve were not just hanging out and waiting for fruit to drop, huh? :) I still like to think they didn't have to deal with squash and roly-poly bugs, and tomato worms though. And I bet they didn't need to fertilize. Just sayin'. Can't wait to find out one day!

Genesis 2:8-9, 15-17

The Lord God planted a garden to the east in Eden. He put the man there whom He had made. And the Lord God made to grow out of the ground every tree that is pleasing to the eyes and good for food. And He made the tree of life grow in the center of the garden, and the tree of learning of good and bad.

Then the Lord God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to work the ground and care for it. The Lord God told the man, “You are free to eat from any tree of the garden. But do not eat from the tree of learning of good and bad. For the day you eat from it you will die for sure.”

That's all I have for this edition. Feel free to write me at jangardener@gardenease.org if you have any questions or comments.

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I'll see you in the next edition!

Jan🤗

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If you have questions, comments, praises, complaints, or ideas about gardening or about the newsletter, you can reach me at: jan@gardenease.org