Gardening Checklist for November - December

With the holiday season approaching, you probably don’t have a lot of time to work in your garden. However, there are a few chores that should be tended to. Besides, it gives you a good excuse to get out into the nice cool fall air, which is especially enjoyable after our hot summer.

• Finish planting all of your spring flowering bulbs in November (except tulips). Tulips should be chilling in the refrigerator for planting in December.
• Continue to practice good garden sanitation. Keep your leaves raked up and place them on your compost pile (or use as mulch).
• Annual rye grass will make a good ground cover for a new lawn to hold topsoil in place and prevent tracking soil into the house. Sow seed at a rate of 8 to 10 pounds per 1000 square feet.
• Large, almost mature tomatoes can be picked just ahead of the first frost. Store them in a cool dark area until ripe. (I usually individually wrap mine in a piece of newspaper and put them in a brown paper grocery sack. I’ve had “fresh” tomatoes in January and February.)
• Use dormant oil spray to control scale and other hard to control over-wintering insect pests. Follow instructions on the label to avoid damage to plants.
• Use the cool, rainy days of late fall and winter to get all of your tools in shape. Sharpen hoes, spades, and mower blades. It’s amazing how much better they work when they are sharp. Put a light coating of oil on all of your tools in order to minimize rust.
• If you need a new sparkplug for your mower or tiller, now is a good time to get one and install it so you’ll be ready to go next spring.
• Idle away some time deciding what changes you would like to make in your landscape. If you are thinking about a new tree or shrub, now is a great time to get it in the ground. That way the roots can develop over the winter and be in better shape for survival next summer.