Rec and Sports

Readying Your Garden Beds for Winter

The success of next year’s garden depends on proper preparation of your vegetable beds this fall. Clearing out dead plants, turning in some nice old compost for soil regeneration, and even planting some early spring crops is the perfect way to ensure the success of next year’s garden.

Insect Free: Taking all old leaves and plant debris off of your garden is the best way to prevent insects from overwintering in your garden. Old leaves on the soil surface provide a nice hiding place for insects, such as squash bugs, grasshoppers, and aphids. If you clear out old leaves and stems and compost them, insects have nowhere to hide. Freezing temperatures will help control next year’s insect population, and reduced debris on the soil surface will ensure freezing temperatures for insects on the sol surface.

Leaf and vegetable litter provides a place for other problems to reside also, such as tomato or potato wilt. Many gardeners had difficulty with tomato blight, or wilt this past year. Collecting and throwing away diseased plants in the garbage or landfill will help keep diseases from reestablishing themselves next season. Most spores from the tomato wilt can be thrown away with the plants and fruit. It is especially important to clear off all plants and fruits from this past season if this was the case in your garden.

Preparing your garden bed: Next, spread one to two inches of well-decomposed compost on the surface of your garden bed and turn into the soil well. Organisms in the soil will have time over the winter to decompose this material and distribute nutrients to the soil for next year’s vegetables.

Fall planting = Spring vegetables: You can plant some early spring vegetables for early harvest in the spring after preparing your soil bed. Sowing spinach seeds, and planting your first couple rows of peas will allow for the earliest harvest. Germination will not take place until soil temperatures warm enough for them to grow. Fall is also the best time to plant your garlic bulbs, although you should probably plant your garlic in a drier bed than your peas and spinach.

No one ever said gardening is easy, but spending a little time preparing your garden beds this fall can help you reap big rewards with next year’s garden!

Betsy Woodworth gives help on greenhouse tips and on greenhouse advice.