How to Winterize an Organic Garden

Taking care of simple sanitation at season's end can go a long way toward preventing pests next year. Clean up the beds and get your organic garden ready for winter.

Difficulty:

Easy

Instructions

Things You'll Need

• Garden Rakes
• Gardening Gloves
• Hoes
• Leaf Rakes
• Lime/sulfur Spray
• Liquid Bleach
• Mulch
• Pruning Shears
• Garbage Bags
• Buckets
• Garbage bags

1. Look over the garden and remember the pests you fought this year. Remove infested and infected plant materials first and throw them away - do not compost diseased plants.

2. Check your garden beds. Cut back dead twigs and stems, and deadhead perennial flowers and shrubs to remove spent flowers. Cut bulky plant materials into 1-inch pieces before composting.

3. Pull out spent annuals and vegetable plants.

4. Remove dead leaves from perennial vegetables and flowers that have finished blooming.

5. Rake up plant debris and compost it.

6. Take a stiff garden rake to the lawn to clean it up. Apply lime or sulfur if a soil test indicates you need it. Use a leaf rake to clean under shrubs and trees - fertilize with phosphorus and potassium every fourth year.

7. Rake leaves out of ground-cover beds. Hoe garden beds to remove weeds and their seeds. Get rid of as many weed seedlings as you can, and apply compost to all beds.

8. Cut down weeds gone wild in hedgerows and alongside your garden - this will deny insects a winter home. Compost all weeds but those obviously infested with bugs or blighted by fungus.

9. Clean out your finished compost to use for mulch, then make more with the debris you've harvested. Use newspapers layered two pages thick for additional mulching, and plant green manure and cover crops to keep weeds at bay.

10. Wash walks and patios, and clean empty pots with bleach and water (using a 1:1 ratio). Roll up and store hoses and sprinklers, store pumps and tender water plants, and clean and oil your tools before putting them away for winter.

Tips & Warnings

• Drain fluids from power tools and store spark plugs outside their equipment.

• Store metal tools with heads plunged into a bucket of sand with a cup or two of fresh motor oil mixed in.

• Set up a cold frame - an outdoor box with a clear plastic or glass top - to extend the season for fresh greens.