Season Tip: Cover Your Gardens Before Winter

There is still time to protect your ornamental garden plants and flowers from the cold winter and prepare them for the spring growing season. Our client in High Falls, NY had us deliver premium commercially baked black compost and spread it out on their garden beds. We then covered it all with 3-4” of locally sourced pine wood chip mulch. The compost will provide concentrated organic nutrients to the soil throughout the winter so that by spring, the soil will be rich and ready for a new growing season. We don’t use any dyes in our mulch. We use freshly chipped, locally sourced pine.

Front yard garden in need of attention
Front yard garden in need of attention

Mulch serves many purposes. It breaks down over time, supplying nutrients for the soil, it prevents weed growth and regulates extreme temperature swings. A thick layer of wood chips protect the roots and flower bulbs from early winter and early spring frost. They will keep cold winds and snow and ice from reaching the soil. It’s like a nice blanket. Mulch also regulates moisture, keeping the soil moist but not wet and keeps it from drying out. And it looks great too! It delineates the garden from the grass, accentuating architectural features in your yard for very little cost. You can never go wrong by covering your garden beds with wood chips.

Wood chips 2

Here’s how we did this job. First we raked out all the debris and dead leaves from the area, leaving the bare dirt and some of the plants remaining from the growing season. Then we spread out the compost. These particular beds have been well cared for so they only needed an inch or two of compost. These clients use their own compost throughout the year that they make themselves out of vegetable scraps and grass clippings, and that’s fine. That compost never gets hot enough to kill any seeds though. Since they have Japanese Stiltgrass on their property, there will likely be seeds in their grass clippings that could be spread. That’s ok too. They use that compost for their vegetable gardens that are tended more frequently.

It takes them a couple of summer months to make two or three wheel barrels of it. We delivered a whole truckload of organic, baked commercial compost that would have taken them years to make in their back yard.

After spreading the compost, we came back with a couple of truckloads of pine wood chips. Pine will take longer to decompose and it smells great. We offer reduced rates for this Specialty Landscaping service since it is outside our busy Poison Ivy season. It’s a perfect fit for you and us!

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