Today we’re talking about one of my least favorite but probably most important fall garden rituals: the great garden clean-up. This is the part of the year where we get to close one chapter of the garden season and start quietly writing the next chapter.
Now that most of the chaos of the garden is done, it's time to be putting things in order, protecting the soil, and setting yourself up for success next spring.
So, today on Just Grow Something we’re talking about:
• What to remove and what to leave in your garden beds
• How to handle diseased or pest-infested plant material
• Best practices for soil testing, amending, and protecting your beds over winter
• And a few tips for the gardeners who have really just had it for now and don’t want to completely clear everything out in this moment. Because I feel you.
Let’s dig in!
Resources:
How to Amend the Soil in Fall for a Better Garden in Spring - Ep. 222: https://justgrowsomethingpodcast.com/episode/how-to-amend-the-soil-in-fall-for-a-better-garden-in-spring-ep-222
Getting Started with Cover Crops - Ep. 166: https://justgrowsomethingpodcast.com/episode/getting-started-with-cover-crops-ep-166
Just Grow Something Merch and Downloads: https://justgrowsomething.com/shop
Just Grow Something Gardening Friends Facebook Group: https://www.facebook.com/share/g/18YgHveF5P/
Check out how you can become a patron on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/JustGrowSomething
Bonus content for supporters of the Podcast: https://buymeacoffee.com/justgrowsomething
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All right, my gardening friends, today we are talking about one
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of my least favorite, but probably most important fall
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garden rituals, and that is the great garden cleanup.
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And I mean, I really should appreciate this a bit more
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because this is the part of the year where we get to close 1
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chapter of the garden season and start very quietly writing the
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next chapter. Now that most of the chaos of
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the garden is done, it is the time to be putting things in
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order, protecting the soil and setting ourselves up for success
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for next spring. So today I'm just grow
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something. We're talking about what to
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remove and what to leave in your garden beds.
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How to handle diseased or pest infested plant material, Your
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best practices for soil testing, amending, protecting your beds
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over the winter time. And also a few tips for the
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gardeners who really have just had it for now.
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And maybe you don't want to completely clear everything out
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and do the soil testing and amending and all the things in
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this moment because I feel you. Let's dig in.
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Hey, I'm. Karen and what started as a
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small backyard garden 20 years ago turned into a lifelong
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passion for growing food. Now as a market farmer and
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horticulturist, I want to help you do the same.
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On this podcast, I am your friend in the garden teaching
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evidence based techniques to help you grow your favorites and
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build confidence in your own garden space.
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So grab your garden journal and a cup of coffee and get ready to
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just grow something. Let's start with why this garden
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cleanup step is so important. When we harvest the last of our
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tomatoes or our beans or whatever the final things are
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that come out of the garden in the late fall and really signal
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the end of the season, what's left behind is more than just
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debris. It's kind of the organic matter
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telling the story of what happened in our garden the
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entire season. But if we don't manage that
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material correctly, especially if we have had heavy pest
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infestations or diseases that we have, you know, had, it can
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really harbor fungal spores, insect eggs or overwintering
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adults of those pests and bacterial diseases that are
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going to overwinter in the soil or in that debris.
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So garden cleanup isn't just about tidiness, although that is
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part of it. Because I'm telling you, the
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kitchen gardens have looked an absolute disaster for multiple
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months now and I'm honestly getting tired of looking at it.
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So yes, it is partly about tidiness, but it really is more
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about breaking up that pest and disease cycle.
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So by removing that debris or by composting it safely, then we
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can sort of help to prevent chews like early blight or
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powdery mildew or the squash vine borers or the cucumber
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beetles or whatever from showing up as fiercely next season.
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OK. And so this really is super,
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super important if we have seen any types of diseases or pests,
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and there are very few of us gardeners who don't see
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something like that in some part of our garden.
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The other reason that this can be very important is we don't
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want, even if it's healthy tissue to kind of be going to
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waste. And we don't want to leave our
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soil sort of just bare and exposed for the entire winter.
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So even if we're not concerned about harboring diseases or
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pests in that plant debris, we do want to take some steps to
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recover the nutrients that are still in that dead and dying
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plant material and utilize it in some way, shape or form, but
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also to maybe add some nutrients back into the soil and protect
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that soil throughout the winter time.
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OK, so we'll start with like what we should be removing or
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maybe what to leave in our garden beds.
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And absolutely the first thing to go is going to be that
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diseased plant material. Anything showing signs of
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disease should be pulled and discarded started.
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And we really don't want to be composting this unless we are
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hot composting and that means that your compost is getting to
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140°F or higher. The reason that we don't want to
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compost this if we are doing a cold compost is because it's
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very unlikely that those plant diseases are going to die off in
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a cool compost situation. And so all we're doing is
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basically giving it a little home for the winter to hang out.
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And if it's even warmer in that pile than it is out in the
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garden, that you might actually be growing some of those
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diseases in your compost pile. So just understand how your
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compost pile works and know that if you have very diseased, a
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little bit of disease here and there is not going to be that
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big of a deal, right? If you can chop it up and mix it
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in there, then, you know, don't panic about that.
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But if you have severely diseased plants, absolutely,
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please do not compost that. You want to discard it and you
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want to discard it in a manner where hopefully it's not ending
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up in a landfill. So if you have a municipal
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pickup of some sort that picks up material and takes it to a
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commercial compost posting thing where it does get usually 160°
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or higher, then you should be fine.
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OK, so any of our spent annuals, the tomato plants, Peppers,
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cucumber, squash, whatever, all of those plants that are done
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with their production should be checked for diseases and if they
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are diseased they should be pulled.
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The other thing that you should pull and not compost would be
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any weeds that have gone to seed.
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So we don't want that seed bank waiting around for us in the
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spring to just go ahead and sprout Willy nilly.
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This includes again in your compost pile because if it's not
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getting to that higher temperature, it's not going to
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kill off those seeds. So you're just going to be
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spreading that compost back out into your garden and spreading
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those seeds to go along with it. I have no problem with you
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composting weeds. I think it's fantastic so long
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as they're not diseased, right? And it's all green material.
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It's all got nutrients in it that can break down and be added
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back into our soil. We just don't want the seeds
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from those weeds. So those should be something
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that you do pull and remove. Now what can stay is any healthy
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plant material and yes, that includes the weeds.
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So if you have spent annuals that look perfectly fine at the
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end of the season, just drop them, chop them off at the base
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at the soil level and you can just drop them in place.
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So this is going to do a couple of things.
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Number one, this is going to add organic matter back into the
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soil from the top down South. Everything that's healthy is
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going to get returned into the soil.
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Chop it down, let it lay down. If you do it that way, it's also
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acting like a mulch. So this is going to protect that
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soil from erosion, whether it's from wind or rain or whatever.
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If you are chopping these at the soil line, that means you are
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also leaving the root systems in place.
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So if you cut up the soil surface and you leave those
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roots in place, they're going to decompose naturally, which means
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they are feeding those soil microbes and they are improving
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the structure. The bonus to this is if those
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roots are the root systems of a legume, so you grew beans or
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peas or something in that family, then there are nodules
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in place on those roots, and those nodules are what are
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holding nitrogen. So you are actually returning
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nitrogen or adding nitrogen to the soil because that nitrogen
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didn't necessarily come from the soil to begin with.
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Those nitrogen fixing plants that are in the legume family
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are pulling atmospheric nitrogen into their systems and those
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nodules are converting that into a form that the plant can use.
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It also means that it's stored in those nodules.
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So when the plant is no longer using it, IE you've cut it down,
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those nodules get to breakdown and decompose naturally and
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they're going to release that nitrogen into the soil for next
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season's plants to be able to use.
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So you're feeding the soil microbes, you're improving the
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soil structure, and you're adding nitrogen in this instance
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if it's a legume, back into the soil.
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So that is all really, really important.
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The only ones that you may not want to leave in terms of the
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root system might be something from things like corn, where it
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gets a really hard base to it and the roots don't seem to be
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the real fibrous roots. They seem to be the real, real
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hard roots that kind of come out of the soil.
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In that instance, you might want to go ahead and pull that,
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especially since when we're cutting it, you know, sometimes
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you're leaving the base of that stalk right there in the soil,
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and that can be very, very hard. It actually isn't bad to leave
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it there over the winter time to hold the soil in place, but you
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might find in the spring when you go to plant that you still
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have the remains of that rootstock sort of sitting there.
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So you may find that you have to remove it at that point.
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That's entirely up to you. I have left it in place over the
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season and just dumped straw over top just to kind of keep
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things in place, but found that I've had to come back and
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actually remove the large bits of that rootstock in the spring.
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So you have to decide whether that's worth it to you.
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But everything else, absolutely any of your annuals, you want to
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go ahead and do that if you have perennials or you have biennials
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that are are capable of overwintering, right.
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So you know, things like your your kale or your collards or
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your spinach that obviously can overwinter in the more milder
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climates without a problem. Obviously you want to go ahead
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and leave those, especially ones that are going to pop back up
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again in the spring, to start growing again and give you an
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early spring harvest. Parsley is considered a
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biennial, so it's going to do the same thing.
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You can use that, leave it in place.
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It's going to pop back up for you in the spring and give you
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another burst of growth before it decides to go to seed.
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And if you have perennial flowers and things or herbs that
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are in the garden, we're going to want to leave those.
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But you might also want to leave the seed heads on those.
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Oftentimes, even if those seed heads aren't necessarily
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spreading those crops for us, they are helping to feed the
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birds over the winter time. And so you're helping the
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wildlife at the same time that you're, you know, kind of
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helping hold the soil in place and you're helping that plant
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along. And you might be spreading it,
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too. OK.
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But if any of those perennials were sort of diseased at all
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during the season, this is your opportunity to sort of cut
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things back, clear them out and give them a fresh start for the
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spring. So things that go are anything
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that was diseased, anything that might be insect infested,
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anything that has seeds on it that we don't want spreading, IE
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weed seeds, but things that stay, any healthy plant
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material, the root systems of our non diseased annuals and any
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of your perennials and biennials to include the seed heads that
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are on those. OK, so let's talk about our soil
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health and what we can be doing right now to be sort of prepping
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ourselves for next season. And this is a really good time
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to mention my container gardeners.
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If you are growing in mainly small containers, and I'm
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talking like pots or tubs that you know, can be maneuvered or
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moved around during the garden season.
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Maybe it's not, you know, a raised planter that's out in
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your bed that contains large amounts of soil, but it's it's
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something on your deck or on your patio.
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This might be a good time to empty out those containers,
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depending on the age of the soil.
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So if this is soil that you have had in that container for
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multiple seasons and you have just sort of refreshed it every
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year by maybe adding some worm castings or you have just fed
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the plants really, really well. This might be a good time to
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sort of knockout the old soil, remove the roots, scrub the
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containers really well, and then maybe put them up for storage.
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There are a few reasons why this might be a good idea #1 if you
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are having any sort of disease pressure in these containers,
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making sure that they've been cleaned out really, really well
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and then just putting them away to store them for the rest of
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the winter can actually help to prevent fungal buildup.
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So if you are continuing to see the same sort of fungal diseases
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hitting your plants every single year in these containers, there
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might be a good reason for that. This would be a good time to
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kind of dump it out and really do a good sanitation.
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This also helps keep some of your pots from cracking in the
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freezing temperatures if that's been an issue for you before
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too. But also when we have the same
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soil that is being used over and over again and we're feeding
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that soil because obviously you need to do that in the much
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smaller containers more frequently than you would in in
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ground bed or even a raised planter.
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Often times, depending on the fertilizer that you are using or
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the plant food that you're using, you can get a salt
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buildup. And this is actually very
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detrimental to the plants that are starting to grow in there.
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And you can see this by looking at sort of the edges of the pot,
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right at the soil line. You'll see a sort of white
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buildup that is quite literally salt.
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It's a saline buildup. So it's a good idea to rotate
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that soil out as well. Now, if it's fairly new soil,
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you don't necessarily have to do this if you just refilled these
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pots this year. I'm not one for replacing your
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soil every single season because number one, that's expensive and
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it's kind of a waste, right? But if you've seen any problems
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or you want to make it easy on yourself to sort of refresh that
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soil, then what you can do is gather all your containers up
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and dump all of the soil into one bin.
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It could be a wheelbarrow or some other larger type of a tub.
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Dump all of your soil in there. Mix it up really really well.
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Add whatever nutrients or compost or worm castings you
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need back into that before sorting it back out to your
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plats again. Now, do you have to do that now?
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No. You could dump all that soil
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into a container that you tuck away for the rest of the winter
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in the corner somewhere. And you can scrub all your
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containers and put them up to store.
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Or if you're not worried about, you know, containers cracking or
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freezing or anything in the winter, you can just kind of
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stuck stack them up somewhere out of the way and bring them
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back out and do that in the spring.
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So just know that what you do with your containers really has
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to do with how long that soil has been in that container, how
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many times you sort of refreshed it over the last couple of
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years, and what your disease pressure has been as to whether
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or not you want to dump them out and clean them and start fresh
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again in the spring. OK.
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For the rest of us, once your beds are mostly cleared out,
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this is where that soil of magic kind of starts to happen because
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obviously healthy soil means healthy plants next year and
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fall is one of the best times to build that soil health.
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We want to give whatever we are adding to our soil plenty of
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time to break down, to feed the soil microbes, but also for
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those microbes to be able to break down those amendments that
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we're adding into a form that is water soluble and easy for our
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plants in the spring to take up. That is why I always emphasize
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if you are building new beds that you really are better off
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doing it in the fall so that you can Add all those soil
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components and let them break down and be ready to plant into
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in the spring. It is much, much better for your
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plants. So for your existing beds, fall
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is a really great time to do a soil test.
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OK, this is a great time to not just if you know, if you want to
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do an off the counter, off the counter, off the shelf, it's an
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over the counter test, an off the shelf test to test your
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soil. That's fine.
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That's going to give you mainly those big three macro nutrients,
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your nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium.
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It's also likely going to tell you what your pH is and that's
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going to give you an idea of what adjustments you need to
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make for your plants that are going to be coming in the
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spring. Now keep in mind nitrogen can
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fluctuate widely based on the soil temperature and how moist
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the soil is and you know, all kinds of different things.
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So the nitrogen, oftentimes if you are a pretty intensive
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gardener, you are going to likely always be low on nitrogen
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because that really is the nutrient that the majority of
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our plants kind of tend to take up the most and what we have a
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hard time supplementing. So don't be surprised if it
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seems like every single time you test that you're low on
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nitrogen, kind of let your plants be the guide on that.
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Don't overdo it with the nitrogen amendments, but you
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know, don't let your plants be lacking either.
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And again, this is a great time to make adjustments before
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planting in the spring. If you can take a soil sample
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and send it to your local Extension Service, well, that's
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any of a better idea because you can get a lot of information out
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of those tests. And in most instances, you can
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choose the level of information that you want to get back right
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down to telling them, hey, I am growing vegetables.
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Give me all the recommendations for how to fix whatever problems
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it is that you find. And they'll tell you the number
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of pounds per acre or in, you know, in the instance of a home
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garden, they might say per 100 square feet that you would need
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to add in order to make these adjustments.
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And they'll even give you recommendations of what types of
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amendments you should use so you know you can pay more to get
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more information. You can pay more to have them.
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Also look at the micronutrients. If you're testing your soil
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using an off the shelf test and it always seems to come back
00:19:03
where all of your major, you know, nutrients seem to be doing
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well. They're in normal ranges, but
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your plants still seem to struggle, especially in an in
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ground bed. Then there might be something
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else going on. Your area might be deficient in
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something specific, a specific micronutrient that is affecting
00:19:24
how your plants take up those other macro nutrients.
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So while that's not as common, it is very possible in certain
00:19:32
areas you're short on boron or you're short on, you know,
00:19:36
magnesium or whatever. So number one, you can usually
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look that up on your Extension Service website and find out if
00:19:42
there is a deficiency in your area.
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But this is also the opportunity that you can take to send a soil
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sample into your local Extension Service and have them check it
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out for you. OK.
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No matter how you do it, who you get it from, what do you do?
00:19:56
This is the time when you want to sort of amend and feed.
00:20:00
There are certain amendments that I use in the garden every
00:20:05
single year without fail, regardless of what my soil tests
00:20:10
tell me. And the first one is compost,
00:20:14
just because. It does more than add nutrients.
00:20:18
And as a matter of fact, in a lot of cases, your compost
00:20:22
doesn't necessarily have a ton of nutrients in it.
00:20:26
You're not going to see huge spikes of nitrogen in most cases
00:20:30
from your compost unless you're using like an aged manure, a
00:20:33
composted manure and there's nothing else mixed into it,
00:20:37
right then you're really going to see nitrogen.
00:20:39
But compost in general from food scraps and yard waste and what
00:20:42
we normally would get from our municipal compost is really a
00:20:47
more so about the organic matter and the texture of that soil.
00:20:52
And then it's about feeding the soil.
00:20:54
So I always add compost no matter what my soil tests are
00:21:00
saying. Worm castings are another really
00:21:03
good one for this. It's, it is adding nutrients,
00:21:07
but it's also adding that sort of material that the microbiome
00:21:12
likes to feed off of. And also the bonus with worm
00:21:15
castings is it also tracks more worms.
00:21:17
And we always want that. So if you can get your hands on
00:21:20
compost or worm castings or just some composted, you know, horse
00:21:26
manure or animal manure of some sort that has been mixed with
00:21:29
other things, then that is something that I always add just
00:21:33
in general. Now, if your soil test is coming
00:21:35
back and it's showing low in very specific nutrients, then
00:21:40
there are slow release amendments that you can add to
00:21:44
your soil to take care of certain problems.
00:21:47
So bone meal, rock phosphate, green sand, all of these things
00:21:50
are going to help with nitrogen, phosphorus, potassium.
00:21:53
The I will link to the episodes that I have done that are
00:21:57
talking about which amendments you should use for which thing
00:22:00
and which ones are slow release. Because we want the slow release
00:22:03
ones in the fall, we want them to get the chance to break down.
00:22:06
But if you need to do another amendment again in the spring,
00:22:08
there are other ones that are fast release that breakdown more
00:22:11
quickly that you can use at that point.
00:22:14
So in case you either under amend in the fall, you don't
00:22:19
quite get it to where it needs to be, you can take a test in
00:22:22
the spring again to kind of see where things are AT and and make
00:22:26
some adjustments then as well. But I always recommend starting
00:22:29
this process in the fall, especially if you have not
00:22:34
amended for quite some time. If you are a newer gardener and
00:22:39
soil health or nutrients are sort of a new concept for you or
00:22:44
a new subject for you, then you might not have been doing
00:22:48
anything in terms of feeding your soil and thereby feeding
00:22:52
your plants. And you may be in your third
00:22:55
season of gardening and now all of a sudden you're starting to
00:22:57
see not all the plants are doing as well as they used to, or
00:23:02
you're starting to get more insect predation.
00:23:05
The plants seem a little bit weaker than they used to be.
00:23:07
And oftentimes this is because we have been taking things out
00:23:11
of that soil. The plants have been pulling
00:23:13
nutrients from the soil and we haven't been adding anything
00:23:16
back in. So now is a really good time to
00:23:19
kind of figure out what's going on with your soil and go ahead
00:23:22
and amend it and feed it. And then the third thing that we
00:23:25
want to do at that point is cover that soil.
00:23:28
Bare soil is not healthy. It is.
00:23:31
It's just, it's not good. There is nowhere in nature that
00:23:35
you're going to look out and see bare soil unless there is
00:23:39
something unhealthy going on. There has been a fire, there has
00:23:42
been a flood, there has been something catastrophic that has
00:23:45
come through and wiped that out. Generally speaking, there is
00:23:49
going to be something covering that soil.
00:23:51
It's either going to be leaves that have fallen from the trees
00:23:53
or it's going to be these advantageous plants that come in
00:23:57
and sprout. Usually, you know, they're,
00:23:59
they're what we consider fast growing weeds, but they're going
00:24:01
to come in and they're going to sprout in that bare soil.
00:24:03
Or it is an area that is not advantageous for plant growth.
00:24:09
So maybe directly underneath a tree that also has allelopathic
00:24:14
properties like walnut that gives off an exudate that keeps
00:24:18
plants from growing, right. Those are all special
00:24:21
circumstances in nature where we see open soil, which means we
00:24:25
shouldn't be doing it in our garden.
00:24:27
So we want to cover that soil with mulch, shredded leaves,
00:24:32
throw a winter cover crop out there like a Crimson Clover or a
00:24:35
rye or something, anything that you can do to protect the soil
00:24:39
from erosion. It's also going to help keep
00:24:43
those beneficial organisms active through the winter.
00:24:47
So if we are adding amendments and we want those organisms to
00:24:50
help breakdown those amendments and get those nutrients
00:24:53
available to the soil and to our plants through the winter, then
00:24:57
we need to protect them, right? So covering the soil is going to
00:25:01
help do this. This is also very helpful too,
00:25:04
if you are gardening in raised planters, so you have a lower
00:25:09
volume of soil that's, you know, obviously not in the ground and
00:25:14
you want to get an early start in the spring.
00:25:17
Protecting that soil is also going to help with the
00:25:21
temperature regulation as well. You're going to slow down that
00:25:24
freeze thaw cycle a little bit, OK.
00:25:27
And this is, of course is especially important if you have
00:25:29
any overwinter crops out there too.
00:25:31
You definitely want to be mulching.
00:25:32
All right. So, you know, I don't care how
00:25:35
you do it if it's if it's a straw mulch, if it's shredded
00:25:38
leaves, if you're putting a winter cover crop out there
00:25:41
there if you are just chopping and dropping what you grew
00:25:45
because it was healthy. So we're going to circle back to
00:25:48
that first tip, right? That is a way that you can
00:25:50
protect the soil. Chop it off at the soil line,
00:25:53
let it fall down, let it lay there and start to break down
00:25:56
over the winter time. You're protecting the soil and
00:25:58
you're also feeding it at the same time.
00:26:06
OK, so those are all the things that we should all be doing out
00:26:09
in our garden to clean up for fall, myself included.
00:26:12
But what if you are running out of time before the ground really
00:26:17
starts to freeze out there or you've just run out of energy?
00:26:20
And honestly, who hasn't by this time in November?
00:26:23
Then you can absolutely take, I don't want to call it the lazy
00:26:27
gardener approach. We're going to call it the
00:26:29
efficient gardener approach. OK, easy peasy.
00:26:32
Get out there. As long as the plant debris is
00:26:35
not diseased, cut those plants off at soil level.
00:26:39
Just let them drop on top of the soil, throw some compost over
00:26:42
top of that, throw some mulch on over top of that and walk away.
00:26:47
Seriously. All right, if you just do that,
00:26:51
you're going to protect the soil life.
00:26:52
You're going to feed the microbes, and honestly, it's
00:26:55
going to make your spring clean up a little bit easier.
00:26:57
You might have some more things to do in the spring at that
00:27:01
point to get ready for the season.
00:27:03
That might be when you end up having to do your soil test and
00:27:05
check and make sure that your fertility is doing OK.
00:27:07
But if you just do the bare minimum of cutting down those
00:27:11
plants and then adding some compost and then mulching over
00:27:15
the top of that, I promise you, it's really, really going to
00:27:17
make things easier for you in the spring.
00:27:20
So don't think of garden cleanup as like the end of the season.
00:27:25
Think of it as just tucking your garden away for a well deserved
00:27:28
nap. Your future self is going to
00:27:30
thank you when you open up those beds next spring and you find
00:27:34
rich, workable soil that is just ready to go.
00:27:38
Until next time, my gardening friends, keep on cultivating
00:27:40
that dream garden, and we'll talk again soon.