In every season, you can always take certain steps for the upkeep of your garden. There are different methods that you can follow to make sure your garden stays in a healthy condition and looks presentable. And with an eye to the upcoming season, you may take some proactive steps too.
While it’s not possible to apprise you of all the recommended measures, below we have suggested a few garden maintenance tips that will come in handy as put them into practice in their respective seasons viz. summer, spring and winter/fall:
Summer
Water plants in morning
During the summer season, it’s always advisable to water your plants in the morning that facilitates both growth as well as water retention. The weather is always cooler in the morning, thereby letting water reach right till the roots instead of evaporating as it makes its way down the soil. This way your plants will get the required supply of water and survive the scorching heat.
Improve Soil Quality
Summer heat does not just affect leaves; it takes its toll on soil quality as well. So, you have to find ways to make your soil richer and you can do so by adding organic matter. If you want your soil to retain water and moisture longer, you can add soil improver or compost to it. This way you also end up transferring nutrients to your plants.
Compost creates a conducive environment for worms and microbes, allows the soil quality to remain healthy and wards off pests and diseases that can cause harm to the root systems.
When the weather is warm, you especially need to be wary of grub worms. The larva of these worms is known to feed on tender plants and their roots. If this happens, it will not be long before your plants turn brown and die. Spore solution comes in handy in tackling both grub worms as well as Japanese beetles.
Lastly, to ensure nothing mars the beauty of your lawn area, do away with all those pesky weeds.
Spring
Do a proper inspection
As spring begins, you will first have to do a proper inspection to take stock of all that happened during winters when you were indoors. You will have to see how much damage the plants have sustained as a result of ice or snow and how much cleaning the beds require. You may probably find burrows and damage caused by rodents that you will have to address.
One good thing about the spring season is that you will not feel hot or cold as you take to garden maintenance work. Any fertilizer that you use during this time will contribute toward your plants’ healthy growth in the season that follows i.e. summer.
Focus on hardscaping issues first
Before you actually get going with taking care of your plants and flowers, you can first try to resolve all the issues vis-à-vis hardscaping. In all probability, a few of the hardscaping elements such as fences and trellises will have to be mended or replaced. The gutters will require cleaning and so will benches, sheds, decks and raised beds. You can easily work on these tasks while your plants are lying dormant.
Early spring is not a bad time to plan and create new raised gardens, expand existing ones and clean up the edging of your beds. If weather permits, you can put a fresh coat of sealant or paint on the furniture constituting your garden.
Winter and Fall
Ready your soil for spring
You can ready your soil for spring by adding amendments such as compost, manure or organic fertilisers. When you add nutrients during fall or winter, they will have enough time to break down, thereby making your soil richer by becoming biologically active.
To protect the amendments from winter rain, you can grow a cover crop or mulch the soil.
Grow cover crops
Fall or winter is considered the right time for sowing cover crops such as rye or vetch. Cover crops supply nutrients to the soil and help it draw carbon from the atmosphere. If you plant a legume like clover, you will end increasing nitrogen supply for the vegetables growing in your garden.
Rework your compost
You can think of creating compost all over again as the compost prepared during summer will probably start to lose its effectiveness. And to insulate your soil against the chilly winter, you can actually make use of things that fall offers like autumn leaves, straw etc. and mix them with active green matter and kitchen scraps.
So you see that no matter what the season is, you can always do something or the other to make sure your garden remains in good shape and does not undergo serious degeneration that will then require you to take remedial measures and get into damage control mode. This can easily be avoided if you do the needful every season. And if you find garden maintenance tedious, you can turn to artificial gardening or use a moss wall or a roof garden in your property that will require you to expend less effort for their upkeep.
If you live in Australia, someone like Vista Concepts can easily provide you with artificial green walls, roof garden systems, moss wall, stainless steel wire garden trellis, grass block pavers, etc. Contact them and they will cater to your need promptly and efficiently.
