Fall is a good time for a garden clean-up

As temperatures cool and daylight hours decline, plant growth tends to slow. In addition to being an excellent planting season in our Mediterranean climate, fall is also a good time to clean up our gardens so that they’re healthy and fire-smart.   So…where to start?

Gather your supplies

Fall is an excellent time to clean and sharpen gardening tools. Photo: Creative Commons

• Pruning tools and disinfectants to clean your tools.
• Separate containers to hold material for the compost, diseased plants, leaves, roots, and stems for the landfill.
• Pots for cuttings to propagate.

Clean up

Stacks of unused pots can become hiding places for snails, slugs, and rodents. Photo: Peter Sigrist, Flickr

• Pick and discard old fruit still clinging to the tree as well as fallen fruit. It can spread disease in the garden and attract undesirable wildlife.
• Thoroughly clean your vegetable garden. Save seeds for next year’s crops, remove diseased material, and compost the rest.
• Remove diseased leaves, season-ending annuals, leaves and stems of summer blooming perennials, and other garden clutter.
• Take special care around roses, camellias, and fuchsias, all of which can harbor undesirable larvae, pests, and disease.
• Use your landfill container for plant debris located under and around plants that may be infected with disease or other pests.
• Clean and store unused pots and containers that might offer desirable hiding places for snails, slugs, insects, spiders, and rodents.
• Disinfect garden trellises, tomato cages, posts, and other plant supports to prevent diseases from over-wintering.
• Clean the various clips and ties used to train and support vines.
• Wash your garden gloves.
• Remove soil from your garden tools and clean them with a disinfectant or a 10% bleach solution.  Apply a light coat of oil to prevent rusting if you are retiring the tools until spring.

Check irrigation system

• Run through each zone of your drip irrigation system to check for leaks or other problems. Although you probably won’t be watering much during the colder months, it’s a great time to get your system in good shape for spring and summer.

Prune and shape

• Prune summer flowering shrubs. Remove dead flowers and prune to control the size and shape of the plant.
• Cut back herbaceous spring and summer blooming perennials to encourage spring growth.
• Learn more about pruning.

Weed

Pull weeds before they spread to other areas of the garden. Photo: UCANR

• Pull weeds before they set seed that will spread to other parts of your garden.