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Fall Chores

The weather has been very nice this fall. It's so much easier to get the leaves raked, bulbs planted, lawn reseeded, and the perennials cleaned up on a gorgeous sunshiney day instead of having the wind whipping thru  or freezing rain slapping at you.

While cleaning up my perennials, I always have a stash of bulbs to pop into open spaces as I go along.  The general rule of thumb is to bury them twice the height of the bulb deep.  I don't fertilize my bulbs until after they are done blooming in the spring.   Never fertilize while they're in bloom; it causes a shorter bloom time.   Fertilizing after blooming will actually help the plant to die back quicker; getting rid of unsightly leaves.   I tend to divide my perennials as  I (or a friend) need them.  Sometimes they can get quite overgrown before I get around to splitting them up.  The soil has stayed so damp this season, I'm finding the plants separate quite easily.   Some of the tougher perennials (bee balm, black-eyed susans, montauk daisies,...) I'm actually just pulling up stem by stem.  Though when I need a huge clump, it's still best to just cut down straight into it with a sharp shovel.  Transplanting and bulb planting I continue to do as long as the soil remains workable, usually through the month of November.  I  cover my perennials  lightly with leaves  to help insulate them for winter.  I make sure to clean them off early enough in the spring to let the rain get to them and to be sure the leaves don't rot the plant.

I tend to rake once or twice  when the leaves first drop.   I usually get out in a panic before a heavy rain comes knowing it will only be worse to rake when the leaves are wet.  However, most of the raking  gets done when the trees are totally bare.   At this time the lawn gets a final mowing as well.  I really don't like to mow over the leaves because I feel the mulch that comes from it tends to be acidic where grass grows best in a sweet soil.  

There always seems to be a few bare spots in my lawn after raking.  I scratch the soil a bit and toss some perennial grass seed down.   Something will germinate in the bare spots so it's important to fill those spots now.  I also lime the lawn again at this time.  I like to lime lightly both in spring and fall.  It's best to start with a soil test to see what the pH level is and to determine your lawns specific needs.

Fall clean up is heavy work - I figure it just helps to keep us in shape for snow shoveling!

10/29/00