Fall in California can come with warm days, and also the promise of late fall rains after a long dry summer. Here is our checklist for the our top fall garden maintenance tips and tricks.
General Landscape Management
It’s always a good idea to take a walk through the garden and review general plant health. Do you notice any decline, and can you observe what might be affecting certain plants?
If you notice plants that are nearing the end of their life, or large spaces in beds, fall is a great time to refresh your planting beds to take advantage of free rainfall in the later part of the season.
Fall is also a great time to spread seeds for annual spring blooms.
Maintain Rainwater Systems
In anticipation of late fall and winter rains, now is a great time to check up on your rainwater systems and do any deferred maintenance. Unclogging gutters and downspouts, cleaning out rain barrels or cisterns, and removing debris from swales are all great fall maintenance tasks.
Time to Replenish Mulch
Throughout the year, organic mulch can (and should) break down into the soil. Fall is a great time to replenish mulch to ensure you are maintaining at least 2” in an established garden (and closer to 4” if the garden is still getting established).
Late Fall Pruning
Fall means it’s time to cut back deciduous grasses, and cut back younger sage plants by a third.
Weeding and deadheading can also be a good part of fall maintenance, but take care to practice ‘chop & drop’ (leaving non-diseased pruning cuttings on the soil) for overwintering insects and birds. And if you have any deciduous trees dropping their leaves, please leave the leaves! Leaf drop can create great organic mulch for insects and birds in your garden.
Irrigation Check Up
Don’t forget to check on your irrigation system as the weather begins to change. Now is a good time to flush valves, make repairs, and replace filters, as needed.
o Turn on each valve to check for problems and make repairs.
o Open manual flush valves and flush.
o Clean irrigation filters.
o Seasonally adjust automatic irrigation schedule.
We hope this checklist helps you to dive back into garden care this fall season. Check back around the Winter Solstice in December for a post about our Winter garden maintenance checklist!
And be sure to check out our Spring Garden Maintenance and Summer Garden Maintenance blog posts.
