Putting Your Garden to Bed

Although putting your garden to bed for the winter can feel a bit lackluster, fall is a great time to build your soil up for next year. From removing summer plants to cutting back berry bushes and pruning grapevines, these tasks can be very necessary to enjoy a bountiful harvest next year.

Get a Soil Test

If you’re looking to improve your soil, a soil test can reveal what it may be lacking or what you should add for a great harvest next year, taking the guesswork out of what to do for optimal soil health. Knowing your soils nutrient status can help guide you to growing healthier, more bountiful plants by giving you specific amounts of a nutrient your soil may need for the particular plants you’re growing in your garden. Soil tests can also be very cost effective by ensuring you don’t overuse or misuse amendments and fertilizers.

You can purchase a rapid soil test from a big box store, but it won’t provide you with the in-depth report that your extension office can.

Plant a Cover Crop

Cover crops are another option to enrich your soil during the winter and into the early spring. They can provide your bed with nutrients, suppress weeds, control pests, retain moisture, improve soil quality, and prevent soil erosion during the offseason. Think of a cover crop as a living mulch or a soil fixer!

Knowing what your goal is determines what kind of cover crop you should sow in your garden and when. Some cover crops fix a deficiency your soil may have by getting nitrogen from the atmosphere, while others help your soil maintain the existing nitrogen it already has. Some I suggest are Hairy Vetch, Clover, and Winter Rye.

Prep Your Bed for Spring

If you’re satisfied with only having a warm weather garden, there are a few tasks you can do now to get a jumpstart on spring gardening. A big one is to cover your bed with layers of a few inches of compost, fallen leaves, yard debris, and mulch, which will help suppress weeds.

There are a few basic types of mulch that most of us have access to. Hay or straw mulch is great for insulating the ground, but try to make sure no spray or other chemicals were used on it. Wood shavings also make good mulch and provide more nutrients than hay. You can even make your own mulch from wood shavings, hay, cardboard, and leaves from your yard, especially if you have access to a woodchipper.

The important thing is not to leave your empty garden bed bare!