I've taken up gardening. We turned our side yard from a junk storage area into a garden. Our first harvests were a little disappointing, because we had some trees overshading the vegetable beds, so I had them cut down. Here's what I'm doing to prepare my Fall garden. I live in Zone 10, so your plans might not be the same:
- Watering more than usual - deep morning watering to leech out built up alkalinity
- Harvesting fruits and vegetables as they ripen
- Planting vegetable seedlings and sowing seed for fall harvests
- I choose lettuce, cabbage, climbing beans, broccoli, cucumber, onion, squash, watermelon
- I might add carrots, parsley, radishes, cauliflower, Swiss chard and beets
- Eggplant and celery are good, too, but I'm not planting those
- Picking herbs to dry
- Preparing rose beds for fall planting of new potted roses
- Pruning hybrid roses
- Fertilizing plants with Fall colors with high nitrogen
- Fertilizing summer annuals and container plants with balance, like a 10-10-10
- Applying acid plant food
- Feeding the citrus trees
- Spraying plants hard with the hose to remove pests
- Dividing spring flowering perennials
- Buying seeds for winter annuals
- Planting seeds for perennials
- I'm adding columbines, pansies, violas, snapdragons, forget-me-nots
- Pruning and fertilizing everything in the hanging baskets
- Planting Fall blooming bulbs
- Buying bulbs that require a winter chill
- Spreading new layers of manure and compose as needed
- Taking cuttings of plants I want to propagate
- Checking for and removing damaged/diseased foliage
We won blue ribbons at the local fair this year for our pears, apples, plums, grapes, cantaloupe, lemons and container plants. We won red ribbons for the zucchini and limes. I'm probably forgetting one or two things.
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