For those of you who are still frantically committed to garden work, let me offer the following schedule of fall garden chores. I’ve used this schedule quite successfully in the past 30 years in USDA zone 4 (you’ll have to adjust for warmer or colder)
Survival rates using this schedule are optimized – anything done after the suggested dates has a reduced chance of surviving the winter. I’m not saying it can’t be done outside these windows, I’m simply saying that trials in the nursery and gardens show these are the times for maximum survival rates.
Perennials: Get them into the garden or transplanted before the end of September. It doesn’t matter whether they still look good or not. Whack ‘em back and move ‘em if you need to move them in the fall. Otherwise, wait until spring.
Evergreens: Spray the heck out of them with an antidesiccant and get them in before the end of October. Keep them damp right up to freezeup.
Woody shrubs and trees: move after the leaves have fallen and they can be planted right up to freezeup with little reduction in winter survival. Again, keep well watered in the fall before freezeup.
Bulbs: plant 6-8 weeks before freezeup. Planting sooner (when you can find them in the store) is a great recipe for having the bulb spring to life in the fall and then you get to wonder why it doesn’t bloom in the spring.
Annuals: Get them indoors any time now before they get too hardened off by cold weather. If you want them to keep on blooming indoors and produce a lot of new shoots for propagation purposes, don’t allow them to get really hard. The low light levels will be bringing them down in any case now so don’t allow cold weather to add to this.
There. That about takes care of my fall gardening statement. More next week on what I’m doing this fall.
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