prepare a raised bottom garden for winter makes spring horticulture much easier .
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Preparing a raised seam garden for wintertime will set you up for winner in the give . If you take the time in fall to do a few childlike maintenance tasks , you ’ll be ready to go for the next growing season . For good example , it ’s the perfect fourth dimension toimprove tire out out soiland hangout rotted bottom frame . Use the following tips to help you heighten and protect leaven garden seam through wintertime , so you ’ll have a shorterto - do listing at the starting line of the next growing time of year .
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1. Remove Weeds and Old Plants
Pollinators and other wildlife often winter in sometime leafage bedding material and the stem of perennial plants , so it ’s ripe to leave these items in your upgrade bed garden until the atmospheric condition warms in outpouring . However , if you ’ve been growing vegetable and one-year flowers and herbs in raised beds , go before and pull those old plants up andadd them to your compost pilewhen the plants die back in fall .
Do n’t summate any diseased plant material to your compost pile . Put that in the trash to avoid creating problems for yourself next yr .
2. Conduct a Soil Test
Soils become depleted over time , which can lead to implant nutritious inadequacy and boil down harvest payoff . you’re able to avoid these problems bytesting your soilonce every three years and adding amendment if needed . While tests can also be do in give , fall is usually the best time for soil testing because it gives you more time to add amendments and incorporate them into the soil before you require to start get anything again .
3. Apply Soil Amendments
Someslow - release soil amendment , like gypsum and atomic number 16 , should be applied in fall because they take a while to break up down into the soil . drop is also the good time to tally manure to your garden since clean manure can burn growing plant life , and even of age manure can pose a health fortune if it ’s apply to gardens around harvest time fourth dimension . Compost can be applied in either spring or twilight , but if you add it to your raise bed in fall , you ’ll have less to do when the busy growing time of year rolls around again .
4. Plant Cover Crops
covering cropscan be used with or in place of compost and other soil amendments to add nutrients to conjure bed gardens and protect the soil from harsh winter conditions . These “ unripened manures ” are typically imbed about one month beforethe first frost of fall , and then they ’re tilled into the soil in spring . you may expend dissimilar types of cover crop in your leaven beds , but rye , crimson clover , buckwheat , and field peas are popular pick .
5. Install Season Extension Products
Many dusty - weather crops can be grown through winter in mild areas without extra protection . However , if you dwell in a moth-eaten mood and want to grow wintertime veggies in your raised beds , add together cloches , grow tunnels , or otherseason - extension productsmay be in order . Watering plants thoroughly before the ground freeze can also make them less vulnerable to stale impairment .
6. Add Mulch
Mulch is an essential part of any garden , but it ’s even more important in raised beds where the soil is more expose to the elements . Although mulch may not ferment well with covering fire crops , it can keep other territory amendments from leach off , and it ’s ideal for sheltering recurrent plant roots from wintertime damage .
Because mulch is an insulator , you may want to scratch some of it away in spring to help the soil in your raised beds warm up quicker .
7. Put Away Plant Supports and Labels
After you exonerate out your vegetable beds for the class , it ’s prison term to amass up stray plant label , industrial plant funding , tomato Cage , and trellises andpack them away in your potting shedor garage until spring . If you chance any minute of cotton fiber or jute garden string , you could fling them in your compost pile .
Some plant disease hover ongarden tools through wintertime , so clean your supplies with a 10 % bleach resolution before stash away them .
8. Conduct Repairs
If you ’ve comment any damage to your raised garden beds during the growing season , use the still 60 minutes of fall to smarten up up your raised bed frames and make any necessary repairs . That can search like adding a wise pelage of paint , replacing rotting boards , or using sturdy lengths of rebar to make frames a scrap straighter . If the soil line has devolve , you may also desire tofill the raised bedsup again .
9. Drain Drip Lines
body of water expand when it freezes , which can causedrip production line and hosesto rupture during the wintertime months . Protect your hose lines from damage by enter the end valve and drain them thoroughly before winter hit . Empty drip lines can ordinarily be leave in the enkindle bed through winter , but automatic timers , filters , and air pressure governor should be moved indoors until bounce .
10. Expand Your Garden
There ’s no such matter as too much horticulture space . If you want to expand your raised bed garden oradd new beds to your yard , install composition board over the area where you project to put beds and apply thelasagna horticulture method to build up fresh soilover winter . When springtime returns , add a leger panel skeletal frame around the soil and protrude planting in your young nurture bed .
