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Yep. For those of us in the north at least, this is it. The End. Finis. Goodbye, garden.
I thought it might be fun to share some hints. I went to a little garden club talk last week and they said that for roses, build a pyramid of mulch. I think they used either plain garden soil or compost. They said that before that they had used salt marsh hay but animals got into it.
So I am making the pyramids of soil around the base of the roses to protect them. They said to build them tall. Today I gathered salt marsh hay! Just a little bit since I didn't have a container with me--but I don't think I'll have a problem with animals. May as well use it since I finally live by the ocean.
For everything else I'm just going to dump the soil from my outdoor container plants around them. Oh--and I think I will throw some lime around. It takes a long time for it to break down so better to do it now.
Hi there,yes I did make my garden winter ready,cut back bushes,used the raked partial leaves around my plants,did the same thing as you with my roses and clematises.I harvested my last tomatoes and removed all the plants too.I put cedar mulch everywhere around trees and bushes. Not all the leaves have fallen here so more to rake. My bird bathes are washed and clean for spring and garden hose is in the garage.I still have quite a few buds and blooming white roses from my Iceberg bush,don't know what to do at this point.I dug up my vegetable beds all ready for spring and planted garlic,so it will be ready for late summer.Maybe I will plant something else for spring.
I've cut everything back according to the specific plant. Been raking, blowing and vacuuming up leaves. Just read an interesting article which suggests you leave the cuttings from the plants in the garden but rake them into the soil rather than leave them on top. This provides nutrients for the soil. If you leave them on top it promotes growth of bacteria and fungus. Also when leaving leaves on the lawn it suggests you mulch them up finely rather than piles on top of the grass which will inhibit the growth and nutrients from getting to the roots.
After my leaves are done, which might not be for another week or two, I will winter fertilize the lawn.
I never cut my roses back until they are fully dormant, like in February. Should I be doing it sooner? I thought that cutting back too early was like pruning and stimulated the side buds to grow out.
Actually, we just had our first deep frost in Raleigh last night. In two weeks I'll remove the above ground parts of my perennial dahlias, my canna, and what ever else looks like the top is biting the dust. Then I'll add some extra mulch.
luv you and I are in N.C. while the others are further north.
Today I started putting things nite nite too. Yes we will still have warm and sunny days for quite some time but I had some help today and I decided to do what I could while I had help.
I cut back my butterfly bushes and cannas and a few others but left the asters and coreopsis and I still have some purple cone flowers in bloom and of course my knock out roses are full of blooms. I also planted a whole bunch of perennials I had been holding till my deer fence was completed. I planted deer resistant salvia and phlox in the front beds and some other things I bought at Plants Delight Nursery and I even put round up on some grass where I want to expland beds in the back. It was sunny and warn so I think it will work.
I always like to cut down perennials before Halloween cause we have some jerky teens in the neighborhood who walk right through flowers beds and could care less what they break. We have some of the deer fencing left over so I plan to use it to protect some front beds not from deer but from teenage trick or treaters.
In January I will move a few small trees, transplant a few azaleas although they can be transplanted almost anytime, move some hydrangeas and loads of daylilies from front to back. Knock outs will be drastically cut back as well. I don't feel the need for extra mulch here in N.C. I will run a push mower over the leaf pile and spread it around all over the beds.
Until we had our first, and very early, frost last night I didn't have anything to say, we still have all our leaves and the colors have just started to show. I'll be doing most of the "putting to bed" chores in another month, right before Thanksgiving most likely. That hasn't stopped me from browsing the seed catalogs already.
Quote:
Originally Posted by luv4horses
I never cut my roses back until they are fully dormant, like in February. Should I be doing it sooner? I thought that cutting back too early was like pruning and stimulated the side buds to grow out.
Actually, we just had our first deep frost in Raleigh last night. In two weeks I'll remove the above ground parts of my perennial dahlias, my canna, and what ever else looks like the top is biting the dust. Then I'll add some extra mulch.
You are doing the roses at more or less the right time for your area. They do best when pruned just before they break dormancy. Pruning now, especially with the predicted warm up will promote some new growth and the next cold snap will damage it and make it prone to disease. One of the best ways to judge the right time for your exact location is not by zone or date, just look around for the very first forsythia blooming around your neighborhood , and that is the day you need to go out and prune your roses.
I tend to not mulch at this time since we don't get enough cold to need to do it so soon. If I am going to add anything before spring it will probably be when we have gotten more consistently cold nights. The mulch does more to keep the ground from heaving with our all winter long warm-cold cycles in the south than it does as an insulator like it would in a more northern garden. That's been hard to let go for me since I spent so many years mulching by Halloween in the old (cold) garden!
Quote:
Originally Posted by no kudzu
luv you and I are in N.C. while the others are further north.
Today I started putting things nite nite too. Yes we will still have warm and sunny days for quite some time but I had some help today and I decided to do what I could while I had help.
I cut back my butterfly bushes and cannas and a few others but left the asters and coreopsis and I still have some purple cone flowers in bloom and of course my knock out roses are full of blooms. I also planted a whole bunch of perennials I had been holding till my deer fence was completed. I planted deer resistant salvia and phlox in the front beds and some other things I bought at Plants Delight Nursery and I even put round up on some grass where I want to expland beds in the back. It was sunny and warn so I think it will work.
I always like to cut down perennials before Halloween cause we have some jerky teens in the neighborhood who walk right through flowers beds and could care less what they break. We have some of the deer fencing left over so I plan to use it to protect some front beds not from deer but from teenage trick or treaters.
In January I will move a few small trees, transplant a few azaleas although they can be transplanted almost anytime, move some hydrangeas and loads of daylilies from front to back. Knock outs will be drastically cut back as well. I don't feel the need for extra mulch here in N.C. I will run a push mower over the leaf pile and spread it around all over the beds.
Same first freeze here, too, and it came close to equaling or breaking the record low from back in the early 60s! Until yesterday the Cannas were still blooming and green, despite several cold nights. Now they are looking rather brown. I'm glad I got out and photographed a few plants in the last few days because they were a sorry looking lot in some cases when the white stuff melted. My Endless Summer Hydrangea were very late to bloom this year, as were hydrangeas for several other gardeners in the area. They were finally budding and blooming in earnest but now are all mostly brown. That was really sad to see. On the other hand the mums have been wonderful this year and lasted longer than usual and most of them still looked pretty colorful.
Here in the mid south mulch seems to do much more good when added in the spring for keeping roots cooler and the weeds at bay and doesn't do as much as it would for winter time. You may be on to something for our region.
I have had some problems crop up with Eriophyid mites and have been cutting back the echinacea as part of deadheading but plan to get out there before the leaf drop leaves further infection possible for next year. This year's heavy rains also led to a higher incidences of the usual molds and mildews so a lot more of the next few weeks will be spent on cleanup that won't hit the compost pile. I've also got to get some knockouts removed and hauled off. Rosette disease has taken its toll. If only I could come up with a replacement for that area. I'm thinking of trying dwarf crape myrtles but would love something that blooms as prolifically as the knockouts.
I'm sorry to hear about the not to bright teen trick or treaters. Deer fencing might be just the ticket, especially if covered with that awful fake spider webbing. We are too far out in the country for trick or treaters on a regular basis and I don't miss the older ones at all. The young ones are always so much fun to see, though.
I'm in zone 6b/7a, mostly 7a I guess. MD suburbs of DC....all perennials in plastic 20" pots.
(When they 'updated' the zone chart they made it a dual zone category...oy vey)
I usually don't cut my old plant tops until WELL into winter...like almost till spring...say February/March. I actually like to see snow on the brown stalks....sort of like a winter snow scene on an Xmas card.
I DO heavily mulch..but is it OK that I wait so deep into winter to cut the tops? It is cooling a bit here. I know it's fall, and clearing the 'blooming is off the rose' so to speak -- But after a temperature dip, we're getting highs above 60 next week. (60-63).
Just a few things I have are: red hot poker, variegated iris, crocosmia, lavender, hardy hibiscus, zinnia phlox, hollyhocks, amaranthus, amaryllis, asiatic lily.
On my former dairy farm in Minnesota............................we did nothing for the rose bushes in fall and the next year the roses were plentiful and beautiful.
Oh man. I guess I am in the middle...the "upper south." I think it is technically the "northeast," though.
1. Protecting - Trying to baby lettuce, kale and peas in the raised beds. This involves newspaper and plastic sheeting and bricks. The plastic is from my painting project. I am also mulching some small shrubs and recent transplants. I should start burlapping shrubs in a couple of weeks.
2. Cutting back - Just the things I do not want to reseed like garlic chives and wild asters. Sunflowers and coneflowers, I leave for the birds. I have a lot of native seedheads like joe pye weed, evening primrose, asclepias, phlox and goldenrod. I harvest these seeds and broadcast them on the roadside. Yeah...probably illegal.
I don't cut back roses unless they are too big. OP, are you cutting them back because the canes will die? My garden is still young, so I haven't had to cut back my hydrangeas yet. I do give the evil forsythia a trim. I have a ton of them because they were easy to transplant and free...but they have got be kept from rooting along the ground.
3. Moving, planting and transplanting - Bulbs, perennials, and shrubs this year. At one of my favorite garden centers, I got cold hardy camellias and viburnum dentatum...for 1 - 3 dollars per plant! Named cultivars! Yes! (cheap-plant-gasm). I'll be watering the new plants as needed until the ground freezes.
4. Woodland - Now and into winter, I am cutting down or girdling norway maples and excess silver maple saplings, removing chunks of concrete, cutting invasive non-native vines and pulling up garlic mustard. The area is really a waste area, but I do see a little progress.
Yep. For those of us in the north at least, this is it. The End. Finis. Goodbye, garden.
I thought it might be fun to share some hints. I went to a little garden club talk last week and they said that for roses, build a pyramid of mulch. I think they used either plain garden soil or compost. They said that before that they had used salt marsh hay but animals got into it.
So I am making the pyramids of soil around the base of the roses to protect them. They said to build them tall. Today I gathered salt marsh hay! Just a little bit since I didn't have a container with me--but I don't think I'll have a problem with animals. May as well use it since I finally live by the ocean.
For everything else I'm just going to dump the soil from my outdoor container plants around them. Oh--and I think I will throw some lime around. It takes a long time for it to break down so better to do it now.
I'm bringing the geraniums inside.
never thought of dumping the dirt from the potted plants into the garden, what a great idea. I think I will do that in the next few days and then just forget about everything til early next spring, except I still want to plant some garlic so it will be ready next spring. What is the old saying? the road to hell is paved with good intentions, I do have the good intentions, now let's see if I carry through?
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I'm glad I got out and photographed a few plants in the last few days because they were a sorry looking lot in some cases when the white stuff melted. My Endless Summer Hydrangea were very late to bloom this year, as were hydrangeas for several other gardeners in the area. They were finally budding and blooming in earnest but now are all mostly brown. That was really sad to see. On the other hand the mums have been wonderful this year and lasted longer than usual and most of them still looked pretty colorful. 
