Autumn Garden Jobs

Gardening Jobs for Autumn- 10 tasks

1. Dead heading – removing spent flowers will encourage more flower buds to form and open and so prolong the flowering season – at least until the frosts arrive. This is especially true for dahlias, roses, violas, pansies, petunias, pelargoniums and many of the other annual plants.
2. Pruning summer flowering perennials – it is a good idea to prune back any perennials that have finished flowering. These can be cut back hard to ground level and this will encourage a new neat mound of leaves to grow back. Doing this allows air and light to get to other plants which might still be flowering. Catmint, Lady’s Mantle, hardy Geraniums and Salvias are examples which benefit from this hard pruning. 
   This task can be carried out until the end of October. After that it is better to give a lighter prune over for the winter months, leaving the hard prune for spring. You can leave some bundles or heaps of prunings around the garden until spring as useful wildlife habitat.
3. Harvesting fruit and vegetables – lift onions and shallots on dry sunny days; allow the skins to ripen and firm up in a sunny dry place before storing. Treat potatoes similarly. Carrots, parsnips and leeks can be left in the ground until needed.
   Apples, plums, pears – pick before the wasps get them or before they fall to the ground. Use any damaged ones quickly; apples and pears can be stored in boxes in a cool, dry shed – individually wrap in newspaper for maximum protection. Plums and soft fruit need to be used immediately or frozen.
4. Planting Time – Vegetables such as garlic are put in now - by the end of October/mid-November. They need a long season to grow. Quick crops such as pak choi, kale, winter lettuce, rocket, radish can all be sown – they will do best with some fleece protection or under glass.
   Bulbs – daffodils and early flowering bulbs such as crocus and snowdrops should be planted before the end of October. Tulips and later flowering bulbs can be planted from November up to the end of the year.
   This is the main planting season for shrubs, trees, hedges and many of these can be bought bare rooted for a lower cost (and less plastic waste). If you have a spare 10 metre strip, think about planting an ‘Edible Hedge’ –Elderberry, Sea Buckthorn, Hazel, Rowan, Crab apple, Cherry plum, Damson – seek advice on suitable mixes for your site.
   Containers can also be planted up with winter flowering heathers, cyclamen, violas and pansies to give colour over the winter.
5. Dividing herbaceous plants – this is a great time to divide up herbaceous plants – you can see where you have space that needs filling and which have perhaps not flowered well and need rejuvenating; the soil is still warm so transplants establish quickly.
   If you want to clean up ground, lift the herbaceous plants that you wish to save; clean any weeds off them and temporarily hold them in an empty part of a vegetable plot or pot them into containers.
   You can spend the next couple of months carefully forking over the ground to get rid of perennial weeds; perhaps adding compost and replanting the herbaceous plants after splitting up clumps in the spring.
   (Herbaceous means that the plant has non-woody stems that reach their full height and produce flower within one year, before dying back over the winter and then reappearing the following spring ready for a repeat performance.)
6. Meadows – This is the time of year for cutting meadows down. Wildflowers will have seeded and the swarth needs to be cut down as low as possible and after 2-3 days raked off. Watch out if you use a strimmer as toads and frogs may hide in the long grass and solitary bees may be nesting in vole holes. The cuttings will only be good for composting if you turn your heap often – they will have loads of seeds through them and these will grow unless the composting method produces a good level of heat.
   September and early October are also the time for sowing wildflower seed, directly onto the ground if it is bare enough or into plug trays for planting out into a grass sward in the spring.
   Remember annual wildflowers such as poppy, cornflower and corn marigold are best sown onto bare ground. Perennial wildflowers can be sown into a grass sward although you'll have more success if a small area of turf is removed to reduce the competition.
   Include yellow rattle in your seed mix – this is parasitic on grass so reduces the grass competition which allows the wildflowers to flourish.
7. Drying flowers for use over winter/Xmas decorations - pick on a dry sunny day when the flowers still have lots of colour in them. Hang them up to dry in a dry, semi-shaded shed.
   Achilleas, hydrangeas, everlasting annuals, honesty, sedums, lavenders – these are the ones I would start with.
8. Collecting cones/lichen/interesting logs & seed heads for Xmas – out walking? Look out for anything that can be used in your Xmas decorations. Keep them in a dry sunny place where they can be spread out to dry, otherwise they cannot be glued and may go mouldy.
9. Compost heaps – the easiest thing to lose control of in a garden. Autumn is the best time to start getting a grip on your compost heaps as they can, if well run, generate compost for all your soil improvements, containers and vegetable growing.
   Woody prunings must be separated – keep straight bits for staking herbaceous; shred the rest before adding to a compost heap or dispose of in council green waste bins.
   Leaves – collect into black plastic bin bags; stack and leave for at least a year – this is anaerobic composting (no air) and makes a mulch suitable for using in a potato trench or as a weed suppressant topping (it will suppress annual weeds only, not perennials).
   A better leaf composting method is that made from pallets or chicken wire between posts. If it is turned mid-way through the year, it will be usable within a year and should make a wonderful crumbly ‘soil’.
   Annual weeds and vegetable scraps from the kitchen make up the general compost heap. Layer in grass clippings and light stick prunings (chopped up).  Turn frequently to get the heat build-up that helps kill off weed seeds and encourages the material to break down. Good compost can be made within a year and will be suitable for your containers and annual bedding.
   Avoid adding cooked food and eggshells to your compost heap, as these attract vermin. Everything else – especially perennial weeds such as couch grass, willow herb and nettles, also waste herbaceous – council green waste bin only!
10. Take time to sit and enjoy the autumn garden!