Fall Gardening - - MULCH!
To protect plants and bulbs from winter freezes....think mulch. In the Pacific Northwest, we get plenty of sunny, crisp fall days to work in our yards. One of the most important things you can do to protect your investment of plants and bulbs is to put a few inches of mulch around the base of plants and over the tops of bulbs. (see blog on how to care for Dahlias bulbs)
If you're a super sustainable gardener (I'm just aspiring) you probably already have a composter in your yard and you make lovely compost/mulch!! Which would be the most earth friendly and cost effective way to garden!
Well..I'm still working on remembering to add material to my composter. So until it's up and running, what I do is just use a bark/mulch mix, or just plain old bark dust. The idea is to give a 'blanket of warmth' to your plants, so in the NW..just about any 'blanket' will do as we don't have long freezing spells at the valley floor. I'm cheap and I buy a yard and a half of fir bark, which is plentiful and inexpensive out here in Timbertown.
If you can get away from buying the bagged bark or mulch in the home improvement stores, you'll save money. I try to combine the need for winterizing mulch and putting bark over my flower beds. Putting a new layer of bark/mulch down in the fall means less weeding come spring!
I'm all about less weeding.
Jenni
If you're a super sustainable gardener (I'm just aspiring) you probably already have a composter in your yard and you make lovely compost/mulch!! Which would be the most earth friendly and cost effective way to garden!
Well..I'm still working on remembering to add material to my composter. So until it's up and running, what I do is just use a bark/mulch mix, or just plain old bark dust. The idea is to give a 'blanket of warmth' to your plants, so in the NW..just about any 'blanket' will do as we don't have long freezing spells at the valley floor. I'm cheap and I buy a yard and a half of fir bark, which is plentiful and inexpensive out here in Timbertown.
If you can get away from buying the bagged bark or mulch in the home improvement stores, you'll save money. I try to combine the need for winterizing mulch and putting bark over my flower beds. Putting a new layer of bark/mulch down in the fall means less weeding come spring!
I'm all about less weeding.
Jenni
So I finally get to see your blog... where do you compost, I'm debating whether to get me a bin or just a section of my also very small yard where I can put a mesh or something and start doing it... I'm just concerned with racoons getting into it and making a big mess..
ReplyDeleteWe have both a composting bin and a fenced off area (just using old latice materical) for yard debris. I got a nice black round composting container from 'Metro' I need to utilize a section of our side fence that no body does much with and is very shady so, limited growing opportunities, and make a long, skinny, yard debris composting section. I'm thinking of it for tree limbs and rose clippings..stuff that takes a little longer to decompose.
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