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Gardening in autumn is a little depressing – it’s all about closing things down, after all. Disassembly, as it were, and looking forward to 4 or 5 months of cold and/or snow, around here. This year I’ve discovered a new reason to be depressed – looking at all the things I intended to do over the year, but didn’t have the time or energy for.
Depressing aside, it’s a busy time because it’s transitional. Sometimes there’s not much to do, but then suddenly it’s a mad rush. Logistically, I consider it a bit of a nightmare, because everything in containers (and I have a lot of those) needs to be stored eventually, but all at different times. And of course space is not unlimited, so organisation is important – not just for now, but for spring as well when different things break dormancy at different times. A (non-gardening) friend of mine observed it was like moving house twice a year.
One thing I finally did finish was getting rid of the junipers and pushing them through the woodchipper, so there’s a nice layer of very prickly mulch in the shrubbery now. The stumps have been pulled up, but I haven’t decided quite what to do about them yet. Otherwise, task-wise there’s nothing unusual going on; it’s all pretty typical stuff. The main highlight will be to saw a piece of outdoor plyboard (which I have yet to obtain) into a cover for the tub pond; last year’s arrangement of a few boards and a tarp was not satisfactory.
Of course, looking after all the tender plants indoors over winter presents its own set of challenges joys to look forward to.
tonytomeo said:
Autumn for us is the beginning of the winter season, which is as demanding as any other season. If I were still working on the farm, it would be nice when the rain starts and we do not need to irrigate for a while. However, incoming winter meant a whole different sort of work, involving getting ready for storm, cleaning up after storms, getting ready for the next storm and cleaning up after it too, as well as all the other work. We send out most of our material late in winter so that the nurseries get it before spring. I do not think that any season is less work, and if it were, we fill in with work that was delayed from another season.