How to prepare your garden for winter
Autumn is here… The harvest is already harvested, the beds are strewn with rare late flowers that will fade in just a few days, and the trees and shrubs have shed their gorgeous yellow-orange attire and exposed their trunks. But before your beloved garden settles down and sleeps peacefully under a fluffy white blanket, it needs to be prepared for the cold. Believe me, a few days of care in the fall will be a hundredfold rewarded next year, and the trees and shrubs will thank you not only with a healthy appearance, but also with a rich harvest. As you have already guessed, in this article we will talk about how to prepare the garden for winter.
Getting the garden ready for winter is not only useful but also fun: Why not enjoy the last warm days of autumn, especially when the weather is nice outside. Should we get started?
Taking care of the trees
Beginning in early October, fruit trees should be thoroughly inspected for damage and the remaining fruit should be completely removed. Never leave fruit on the ground when you remove it from the branches – it must be disposed of. Just don’t throw it on the compost heap, rather bury it deep in the ground somewhere on the outskirts of your plot. It is not unreasonable to remove other plant debris that may pose a danger to the garden,
Collecting leaves
Collect fallen leaves in a pile and sprinkle them with lime – useful fertilizer for next year has never stopped anyone. And if you need it in the near future, make compost on the spot.
Regarding the autumn collection of leaves, we would also like to note that in recent years, the number of opponents of such an event has increased dramatically. First of all, this is due to the claim that the leaves supposedly serve to protect the roots of trees, which are in the upper layer of soil. But is this true? The answer to this question is up to everyone to choose for themselves.
All fallen leaves should be removed.
Most experienced gardeners today fully agree that leaves should be removed in a timely manner: preferably in mid-autumn. Dormant leaves harbour many pests and pathogens which could cause irreparable damage to your garden in the near future. But there are those who use leaf litter to strengthen the immunity of fruit trees – grafting. But you should not burn the leaves: in this way you will, of course, clean your garden from sleeping parasites, but you will cause irreparable harm to the environment.
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Pruning fruit trees
The most important stage in preparing the garden for winter is pruning fruit trees and berry bushes, which should be carried out in dry weather and necessarily before the onset of persistent frosts. Remember! The air temperature during this process must not fall below e-10°C, as wood becomes very brittle at lower temperatures.
First of all, fruit trees should be removed from dry, broken and diseased branches. You should also prevent branches from growing into the crown of the tree. When pruning the shoots, remember: the cut should be as even and smooth as possible and free of burrs on the bark. Remember that a humid environment is ideal for the reproduction of wood fungus spores, so fresh cuttings should be thoroughly cleaned and treated first with a solution of copper sulfate (1 teaspoon per 1 liter of water), then with garden varnish. Now the cuttings will grow fast enough and keep the tree healthy.
Autumn pruning of the apple tree
After pruning all unnecessary and diseased branches, carefully inspect the trees. If you find moss, lichen, or trout fungi, remove them immediately. Pests like to overwinter in these hard-to-reach places.
If you have tree protectors on your trees, they should also be removed before winter sets in. Just burn the disposable paper towels, and wash and clean the reusable cloth towels before spring arrives.
Treating the garden with insecticides
If fungal growths are found on trees, treat them with fungicides. Treat plants with insecticides to kill garden pests.
Treat the garden with insecticides. Photo from sadoved.com
To get rid of spores of pathogenic microbes causing cocomycosis, scab, powdery mildew and other diseases, spray tree trunks with a solution of urea (0.5 kg of urea per bucket of water), or a solution of copper sulfate (300 g of preparation per bucket of water), or a solution of laundry soap and soda ash (50 g soap + 400 g soda per bucket of water). Ready-made preparations have also proven themselves: Actara, Horus and Karbofos.
Loosening the soil – a method of controlling garden pests
It is better to loosen the root circle with a pitchfork
Excellent results in the fight against garden pests shows loosening of the root circle to a depth of about 20 cm, after which the pests that got into the upper layers of the soil and their larvae should die from frost. It is better to loosen the soil around the tree not with a shovel, but with a pitchfork, so you eliminate the possibility of injury to the roots of the tree, especially young seedlings.
Watering – protects the plant from drying out
Autumn is not every year rainy, so the soil in the garden has time to dry out before winter. So watering is important in preparing the garden for winter. But the most important thing in this procedure is the correct calculation of the amount of water required for each tree, as well as determining the area to water.
There is no problem with the amount of water: use 50 liters per 1 m² of the trunk circumference. The water temperature should be 5°C higher than the air temperature. Regarding the area: Trees up to 5 years old are watered by distributing water around the perimeter of the trunk circumference. Older trees (over 5 years) are best watered around the periphery of the crown. Water gradually, ideally with 15 to 20 liters of water per hour; this will help it to spread out in the soil as evenly as possible.
Moisture watering of trees. Photo from dachadecor.ru
Watering is possible either around the circumference of the trunk or in the holes around the tree. If you pour water into the holes after watering, they should be filled so that water does not stagnate in them during thaws, which can cause irreparable damage to the roots of trees. After watering, it is better to mulch the soil around the tree with peat, humus or compost.
tree watching
The bark of trees in winter also needs protection, and the best way to do this is to whitewash in the fall, which will protect not only from pests, but also from the spring sunburns. Before whitewashing, the trunk of the tree is cleaned of lichen, moss and dead bark. It is necessary to whitewash the entire lower part of the trunk to the base of the lower skeletal branches.
Trees should be observed in autumn.
Use both whitewashing and finishing and independently dilute 3 kg of lime and 500 g of copper sulfate in 10 liters of water. To ensure that the composition lasts as long as possible on the tree and does not repel quickly under heavy rains, add 200 g of carpenter’s glue.
Covering plants for the winter
Garden plants such as grapes, boxwood, clematis, roses, cypresses, thuas up to 5 years old and many others need to be covered for the winter. To do this, use special covering material (such as Agrospan or Lutrasil) or improvised materials (spruce, regular burlap, and even straw).
Roses are covered for the winter
Around the plant construct a house of arcs or wooden poles and cover the selected covering material, securing it with twine. The root part of the plant is also covered with spruce branches or emulate peat.
It is better to cover for the winter and grafting of standard trees. To do this, you can use the same lutrasil or agrospan, tied with twine only on top.
Take care of the snowberry plants.
Oddly enough, the most abundant snowfalls are afraid of evergreens: thuas, spruces and so on. On their fluffy paws can accumulate too much snow, and sooner or later it will lead to the fact that the branches, not being able to withstand the heavy loads, simply break.
Conifers grow and are connected by their crowns.
- Break off the branches – this way you reduce the surface area and the plant will be safe.
- After heavy snowfall, simply shake the snow off the branches.
Protecting trees from rodents
To protect young trees from rodents, wrap ordinary kapron tights around the trunk up to 50 cm high. How to protect your garden from rodents in winter from rodents, you will find in the article.
Preparing a pond for winter
The pond should also be prepared for winter.
If you have a pond in your garden, it also needs to be prepared for winter. When the fish and plants go into your pond in winter, you need to remove the ice and drill holes in some places: this will ensure normal light levels and the necessary flow of air to its inhabitants.
Much more about the complex of autumn activities told in the material. Preparing an autumn pond for winter: the 5 most important tasks.
Preparation of shrubs for winter
Shrubs also need to prepare for winter. How to do this properly, the article will tell you about the subtleties of care for autumn berry shrubs.
Autumn pruning of currants
Black currant bushes are subjected to croning, in which all shoots older than 5 years to the base are removed. Thanks to this simple procedure, the young shoots will grow more intensively with the advent of spring, and most importantly, the main number of berries will ripen. Also carob bushes should be fed with phosphorus-potassium fertilizers, for which 1 tbsp of superphosphate and potassium is used per 1 bush.
Raspberry shoots should be pruned so that only the annuals remain. To make them easy to overwinter, simply bend them to the ground. Given that the fertile layer of soil around raspberries depletes very quickly, apply fertilizer – a bucket of manure under each bush.
How to properly prepare a garden for winter
You can’t even imagine how much work there is to be done in the orchard, in the vegetable garden before the steady snow falls.
Usually the “regular gardening season” ends in early December. The main thing is not to forget anything, so that next year to have a healthy, blooming and fruitful garden and vegetable garden.
Given the importance of this phase, today we’ll talk about how to properly prepare the garden and vegetable garden for winter.
HOW TO PREPARE YOUR GARDEN FOR WINTER
Most of the leaves and fruits of fruit trees and shrubs fall off by early November. Rotting fruit should be removed first and buried somewhere near the fence. It is best not to put them in the compost heap as they may contain pathogens.
If your plants aren’t sick, you can use their leaves to mulch tree trunks. But if in doubt, it is better to burn them on a fire.
After removing leaves and any debris from the site, proceed to fertilize the trees or shrubs (if you haven’t already).
In the fall, all plants need full phosphorus-potassium nutrition with the addition of some trace elements. So it is better to buy a ready-made mineral complex such as “Autumn Fertika” for fertilization of fruit crops (there are other complexes), which contains all these necessary substances for plants.
For each crop has its own doses, which are listed on the packaging. These fertilizers are poorly soluble in water, so they are brought under the fall loosening (or recultivation, depending on the size of the root system of the plant).
Digging (loosening) the bedding circles is also useful because most of the pests that winter under fruit trees and shrubs are released on the surface of the ground.
So immediately after this operation, treat bedding circles and all plants first with preparations against insect pests (such as Fufanon), and the next day with fungicides against fungal diseases (3% Bordeaux mixture).
After such a treatment, most of the “enemies” of the garden will die.
Read more about winter garden pest control in our article: Winter garden pest control.
The next step is to whitewash the trunks from the base to the forks of the first and second rows of the crown. It is better to buy ready-made whitewash and dilute it with warm water in the proportion indicated on the package.
Ready-made whitewash, in addition to the necessary components, also contains fungicides and insecticides, which additionally protect plants from pests and diseases.
However, the main function of whitewashing is to protect the delicate bark of trees from spring fires and frostbite caused by sharp differences in temperature between day and night.
After all of the above procedures, you can cover the bedding circles.
Frost-resistant plants such as apple, pear, quince, yosta, wild rose, viburnum, hawthorn, chokeberry, gooseberry, black and red currant do not need to be covered for the winter. Although in the first 5 years after planting, it is recommended to cover their trunks with dry leaves or straw with a layer of 30-40 cm.
Heat-loving fruit trees and shrubs (apricot, cherry, plum, cherry, pear, mulberry, almond, and others) require more thorough protection.
Spruce trees are placed on a 40 cm layer of fallen leaves in the rooting circles, and in harsh winters also on a layer of thick non-woven covering material (e.g. Spanbond).
Root system protection should be continued if the air temperature falls steadily to +3 … -1 degree, otherwise the roots of the plants can get hot.
In case of dry, hot autumn for all fruit crops in late October – early November, conduct abundant watering (for trees – 70 liters per plant, for bushes – 40 liters).
Great damage to fruit trees and shrubs can be caused by rodents. Fir – branches that have been tied to the trunks and laid under them with “needles” Heuft from them.
Specific crops such as blueberries, twice a year (in spring and autumn) should acidify the soil (to pH 3 – 3.5). Therefore, the soil under it in early November is acidified with a solution of citric acid (3 tbsp. per bucket of water for each plant).
For more information on how to plant the plant correctly, and how to care for blueberries, read our article: “How to breed blueberries”.
On blackcurrant bushes (over 8 years old), carefully cut off all old and withered shoots at the bottom of the bush. The cuts can be immediately disinfected with potassium solution and covered with garden varnish.
After this operation, the young shoots will grow much faster in the spring.
Read in our article, how to care for black currant: “How to grow black currants on your plot”.
Remontant raspberries, which give a crop of electric grafts, cut from the floor, let the stump height of 3-4 cm, treated against pests and diseases and covered as heat-loving plants.
Common raspberries, which on the shoots of the second year of fruiting evade the bars, are ducked to the floor and also cover them from above.
Read more about how to care for raspberries in our articles:
How to prepare your garden for winter
It is very important to remove all plant debris from garden beds. Last season, vegetable plants absorbed a lot of fertilizer, so they will have to be replenished in the spring.
In the fall, apply organic fertilizer (2 buckets of decomposted manure or compost per 1 square meter). It is better not to use fresh manure. We recommend putting it in the compost heap of the current year.
Also add to the ditch (per 1 sq. m.): 3 tablespoons. A double spoon of double superphosphate, 1.5 tablespoons. A tablespoon of potassium sulfate and half a bucket of wood ash. If the tone of the floors is heavy, add another 1 bucket of sand and 1.5 cups of dolomite flour.
After re-cultivating the beds, it is recommended to sow them with a few winter fluke or white mustard, which, on the one hand, prevent the growth of weeds, and on the other hand, contain additional fertilizers and trace elements.
Unusual and shaped beds can be covered with straw or hay, and then covered with black film. Sow such a bed with early vegetables can be in mid-April, as at this time the soil is well warmed.
In November, form beds for subcircular plants of vegetables and mark furrows 5 cm deep, radishes and other small vegetables.
On top, mix them with dry humus with sand. In the spring, such seeds will sprout 2 weeks earlier and give a good harvest of healthy, tasty vegetables.
For more information on how to pretend subwinter plants and the crops you can use for this, read our article, “Subwinter Planting.”
November is usually when most lawn work is done. At this time, all the gaps and irregularities are clearly visible, so you can get rid of them very easily by planting new seeds.
Read more about how to make a lawn on your plot in our article “Lawn – with your own hands”.
In November, carry out snow retention in the most blown out places on the site. Arrange shields, protective walls of boards or plywood, spread cut branches or old mats.
After October 25-27, all planting of fruit trees and shrubs stops. After this deadline, remove a few sparse seedlings and bury them until spring.
For details on how to do this, read our article: “How to bury seedlings for the winter.”
We’ve told you how to properly prepare your garden for winter. If you do everything as we recommend, next year you will already get tall plants of useful fruits and vegetables on your plots!
