by Lisa Mulder
This fall, as we were preparing the Renfrew Community Garden for winter, I saw a lot of questions about winterizing. Winterizing is a term we bounce around a lot but what is it? Why do we do it?
Winterizing a garden means something different from gardener to gardener. In the garden that I have in my yard, I winterize to protect the soils, moisture, and biodiversity. For the Renfrew Community Garden, it means being good neighbours to our fellow community gardeners and to the surrounding community. We also want our future community gardeners to get a fresh, clean bed in the spring.
What winterizing to protect soils, moisture, and biodiversity means to me is protecting my garden soils with a mulch, which for me is this past summer’s finished garden plants. I distribute these used plants over the surface, covering exposed soils. In addition, I dump my pots (used for potted plants over summer) on the garden, leaving the root ball whole to create topography to capture snow. Snow additionally insulates the soil and adds moisture as it melts later. I leave many of my old plants in place to freeze, dry out, and eventually rot a bit over winter. This organic material nourishes the soil biota, even over winter and into spring. I remove all trellises and other hardware for the winter. In the spring, I just scoop up all this plant material and put it in compost.
Using this method, you have to be very careful of two things: distributing seeds into your garden soil and harbouring disease from one summer to the next.
Distributing seeds could be awesome or terrible. Every year I get a reseeded crop of purple romaine lettuce that I leave to go to seed. I love this early lettuce – so this is awesome! Alternatively, this fall I used my overgrown marigold as mulch (they are full of seeds)… I will have to aggressively weed marigolds for a few years; I will regret this later!
Harbouring disease is a more serious issue. This summer, I discovered an early infection of a tomato canker in my garden… so this fall I had to move all evidence of tomatoes into the city compost program (that’s why I used my marigolds as mulch). Hopefully catching the infection early and removing the infected plant material will break the disease cycle.
At the Renfrew Community Garden, winterizing primarily means being good neighbours. If a gardener is retiring, they are required to thoroughly clean all plant material from the surface of the soil of their raised garden bed and underneath (roots, etc). If a gardener is committed to returning for next summer, they may keep some plants in their beds, such as garlic or perennials such as chives. In any case, all trellises and other hardware must be taken home. The beds may be mulched over with leaves.
You may have your own preferences for winterizing your garden. It makes for interesting discussion between gardeners. If this fascinates you, please contact us at [email protected] and join our community. Gardeners and non-gardeners are all welcome!
