3 Organic Gardening Projects – Happy Fall

3 Organic Gardening Projects – Happy Fall
September 26, 2022 Sabine Schoenberg

When the morning air is cool, it’s time to get into the happy fall garden experience.  Here are the three most important organic gardening tasks to create a happy fall gardening experience on your property.

1. Leaf Removal – The Organic Way

Throughout New England and Midwestern states, you have beautiful foliage. However, after a few days of beautiful happy fall days, leaves drop. Some people advocate just leaving the leaves as organic material. However, this is not the best for your lawn. So what’s the best practice? Composting the leaves:

  1. Most of today’s municipal transfer stations compost leaves today.  All you have to do is gather up the leaves, and bag and transport them to the drop-off station(s).
  2. Less known are that commercial lawn mowers have an attachment with which your gardener can shred leaves on site. The resulting “mulch”- like material can then be spread around your bushes and plants on your property to provide nice protection from the winter cold. Over a few months, the material will break down further into new topsoil.  It’s an organic gardening win, win.

For suggestions on how to create compost check out SHGLiving’s Cali Kim. Or see how Ashley Renne guides her gardening friends. Composting even works in a Tiny Home. So give it a try.  You see just how important fall composting is for your garden’s health year around.

2. Happy Fall Fertilizing Shrubs Organically

Happy fall days are days spent outside in your garden. Pick a day when temperatures are still mild and spread organic fertilizer like Hollytone and Plantone around your acid-loving shrubs one more time. 

It helps your shrubs to build strong root systems. Your plants will thank you with more beautiful flowers and resistance to drought from stronger roots the following year.

3. Effective Organic Winter Deer Protection 

For many gardeners, happy fall gardening must include anti-deer treatments to save your azaleas, rhododendrons, and other plants from being nibbled to stalks during the winter months by deer.  There are many sprayed deer repellant products on the market.  They do not smell good to deer, rabbits, or human noses. However, regardless anti-deer spray has to be applied at least once a month throughout the winter months.

There is a general consensus that the ultimate deer protection is a barrier method, a.k.a. a deer fence. If you are among those who feel deer fencing is an ugly addition to your garden, check out…….on ways to cleverly conceal deer fencing.  

There is one more, relatively new and effective method out of Germany to keep deer out of your garden. It was discovered that deer stay away from blue light.  As a result, there are German companies that offer battery-powered blue lights which blink in different patterns throughout the night. It works! While this is nighttime protection, deer learn quickly to simply stay away. For gardeners, this is perhaps the best, happy fall news.

Try the above-mentioned effective and organic gardening methods to get your garden ready for the winter.  Happy fall gardening is knowing that your shrubs and plants are well protected through the winter months so that you can pick them up come spring.

 

Photo: Joseph Gonzalez