Hello and happy pumpkin spice season to those of you who celebrate ! ( I definitely do . ) This summer start by quick , but what could be better than pumpkins , hooded sweatshirt and descend coloring ? How about potato leek soup with hoar - buss leek from the garden , or an entire stalk of brussels sprouts ? I hope you ’re savoring harvest time of year as much as I am .
Q : Should I strip out my vegetable garden in the drop , or get out the dead plants there all wintertime and houseclean them out in the fountain ?
A : This is a great question , especially for fresh gardeners who might see self-contradictory information about leaving the leaves or leave winter interest . I am a openhanded fan of leaving my perennial areas - especially the aboriginal plantings - a little messy for the winter . But when it come in to vegetable garden , it ’s a different story .
Jennifer harvests her leek crop.
veggie , for the most part , are tropical plant that did not evolve to grow here in the cold north , even though they ’ve been cultivated successfully here for age . Because world have been growing them in such great numbers and for so long , pest and diseases that target these plants incline to spread around and stick around . One thing that help us avoid them is careful crop rotation , but the other is clean up industrial plant rubble at the end of the season so bacteria and viruses wo n’t overwinter in the soil .
Both modest inconveniences like powdery mold and big problems like verticillium wilt , fusarium wilt and mosaic virus can all winter in your dirt . Some viruses are downright nasty ; baccy mosaic virus , for example , can persevere in soil for up to 100 long time !
My cucumbers often get blight and/or powdery mildew in late August or early September . I do n’t wait very long to pull the whole plant and give up for the year when this happens . To be extra safe , I put any plant material that shew signs of disease in the urban center yard waste rather than my own compost bin .
Cover crops hairy vetch and winter rye grow in a community garden plot.
So , yes - clean your vegetable garden out after or a hoarfrost or when you ’re done harvesting the frost - brave kales , brussels sprout and scallion . If you clean house out any areas by the end of September , you will have time ( in zones 4 or 5 ) to quickly grow a covering crop that could be turn over in the bounce . My favorite cover craw for my vegetable garden is a mix of hairy vetch and winter rye from High Mowing Seeds , but there are many pick out there .
Another great inexpensive filth constructor is to chance a friend with a chicken coop - if they clean it out in the fall , offer to take away the old bedding chaff . It will be high in atomic number 7 and C , so if you go around it out after you remove your plants , it can compost in place over the winter and be flex in come bound . Be aware of wind focus while doing this oeuvre because it does n’t smell the greatest .
I also farm comfrey as a stain amendment . There are many online tutorials of the various thing you’re able to do with comfrey , like make compost tea or add it in layers to your compost bank identification number , but I often simply pull the farewell and lay them on top of the soil . They break dance down by spring . It ’s another easy way to sum nutrient and constitutive matter to your veggie garden .
High in nutrients, comfrey leaves can be spread out on the vegetable garden and will compost in place.
So now that we have some musical theme for winter our vegetable gardens , let ’s talk about perennial . There is a short ton of value in leave perennial flower area of your yard unkempt for the wintertime . Seed heads of plant life like purple coneflower not only look fabulous in the snow , but they cater a intellectual nourishment source for bird . Many of our aboriginal bees , moths , and butterflies overwinter in fore of plant like Joe - Pye weed or under passel of plant life dust .
So , there you go ! Clean up your veggie garden , sow a cover harvest or put down a soil amendment and put up your feet while we wait for our first frost to make it . But leave some leaves and plant detritus in your recurrent beds - pollinators will give thanks you for it .
Jennifer Rensenbrink is a University of Minnesota Extension Master Gardener for Hennepin County . She farm native plant , vegetables and fruit in her south Minneapolis M . you may fall out her gardening adventureson Instagram .
Purple dome asters pack a powerful fall punch.
To learn more , join a webinar or shop …
