Fall garden cleanup can be very stressful, but it doesn’t have to be. In this post, I will talk about when to start getting your garden ready for winter, and which chores you can skip. Then we’ll talk about how to clean your garden, and I’ll give you my five best garden cleaning tips that will simplify your life!
Fall is such an incredibly busy time of year for us gardeners. Between the harvesting, canning, pickling, freezing, chopping, eating, cooking, and fighting the first few frosts (after a summer of fighting heat, drought, bugs and diseases – wait, why do we love gardening so much again?).
Whew, I’m exhausted just writing all of that! Fall garden cleanup is one of those big stresses. But guess what, it really doesn’t have to be stressful!
Table of Contents
Do You Really Need To Clean Your Garden In The Fall?
When I first started gardening, I thought I had to completely clean my garden, and get everything done before winter came. And I mean everything.
I thought I had to clean up every little bit of dead plant material, fallen leaves and other debris in my garden in the fall (I’m a bit of a clean freak). OMG did I make things stressful for myself!
Well guess what? It turns out, you don’t need to have completely clean garden in the fall after all. In fact, it’s actually good to leave many things in the garden until spring.
My garden before fall cleanup
Fall Flower Bed Cleanup Chores You Can Skip
Contrary to popular belief, you do not need to clean the garden out completely in the fall! Here are three major fall garden chores that you can skip all together if you want, which will save you tons of time (and stress!)…
1. Leave the leaves in your flower beds – Leaves are good for the garden and feed the soil as they break down. So don’t waste time on fall leaf cleanup in your garden.
You should leave leaves in flower beds. They’ll break down quickly, and you can mulch right over them in the spring.
2. Leave the foliage on your plants – Dead plant material is a wonderful place for beneficial insects to hibernate during the winter.
Cleaning flower beds of all the plant material in the fall means you could be destroying all of those good bugs.
The one exception to this is irises. You definitely want to cut those back in the fall to avoid an iris borer infestation next summer!
3. Leave the flowers in your garden – Flowers like coneflowers and sunflowers have seeds that feed the birds and other wildlife through the winter.
Many types of flowers also add wonderful winter interest to the garden. So you can continue to enjoy your gardens even when they’re covered by snow.
Of course, if you completely skip all of your fall yard work, that means you might end up being doubly stressed out trying to get it all done in the spring. We don’t want that!
So let’s talk about when to start your fall yard cleanup, and then I’ll jump into giving you tips to make it much easier for you!
Leave the foliage on your plants in the fall
When To Clean Up The Garden In The Fall
The best time to start your fall garden preparation is after the first few freezing nights have killed back much of the flowers and foliage on the plants. Of course, you can start earlier than that if you want to. But be careful starting too early.
Freezing temperatures are a trigger for perennials that it’s time to begin the process of going dormant for the winter.
If you start cutting back your plants too early, it could trigger new growth on the plants, and you don’t want to do that in the fall.
5 Fall Garden Cleanup Tips That Will Simplify Your Life
Ok, we talked about which chores you can skip on your fall cleanup checklist, and when to start cleaning the garden.
Now let’s talk about how to simply the chores on the list! Over the years, I’ve come up with several shortcuts for my end-of-year garden cleanup, and now I get to share my simplified fall cleanup tips with you.
1. Don’t cut everything back – As I mentioned above, leaving plants in the garden through the winter can be beneficial. But you don’t want to be overwhelmed in the spring either. So, let’s compromise!
In the fall, cut down early blooming perennials and any plants you don’t want self-seeding all over the garden. I cut back my earliest perennials, like peonies, bulbs and irises.
I also deadhead plants like rudbeckias, columbine and liatris because I don’t want them spreading seeds all over the garden.
By cutting down the early perennials during your fall garden cleanup, you’ll buy yourself a month or so before you have to worry about cleaning up the gardens in the spring.
Peonies can be cut back in the fall
2. Get yourself a leaf blower – Trust me on this. You’ll discover that a leaf blower is worth every penny. I used to be a rake girl, and actually kinda enjoyed raking the yard (until my arms felt like they would fall off).
But now that I have one, I can’t believe how much easier a leaf blower makes my fall garden cleanup chores. All I have to do now is blow the leaves right into my garden. Or blow them into a nice neat pile. Easy peasy!
3. Use your lawn mower as a leaf vacuum – The best way to remove leaves from yard is to use your lawn mower like a vacuum cleaner to suck up the leaves from your lawn.
Put the bag attachment on your mower, then blow or rake all the leaves into a loose pile and simply mow them up.
Then you can dump the mower bag into your garden cleanup bags, into the compost bin, or directly into your garden to use as mulch!
Or, leave the mower bag off and mulch the leaves directly into the lawn instead. Leaves aren’t just great for the garden, they’re good for the grass too!
Using my lawn mower to simplify fall leaf cleanup
4. Use a hedge trimmer to cut back your perennials – This one was actually my husband’s idea. A few years ago, I was super far behind on my fall garden cleanup chores and asked him to help me.
When he saw me down on my hands and knees using hand held garden clippers to cut down my perennials one by one, he was like “why the heck are you making it so hard on yourself?” (my words, not his – haha!). He disappeared into the garage and came back out with the hedge trimmer.
I was confused (and slightly alarmed) for a minute, then once I saw how quickly and efficiently he was chopping down perennial after perennial, I was thrilled!
All I had to do was follow behind him and pick up the debris. Can you say game changer?! (he might regret that, cause guess who’s my fall garden cleanup helper for the rest of eternity!!)
Awesome! Double easy peasy! Note: you could use hand held hedge trimming shears instead if you don’t have a hedge trimmer.
5. Focus on the critical tasks and let the rest go – Gardening is not one of those hobbies where you can control every little detail, and have it all turn out perfectly. (This is a lesson you probably learned after about the first 5 minutes of gardening.)
So focus on the most important fall garden tasks, and let the rest go. I wish someone would have given this advice when I first started gardening (although, I probably wouldn’t have listened anyway!).
I hope that this list of ways to simplify your fall garden cleanup will really help to take the stress out of putting your garden to bed for the winter. And now that you know how to clean the garden without all the stress and overwhelm, maybe you’ll have more time to enjoy your fall gardens!
If you’re looking for a comprehensive fall garden cleanup checklist, get my full list here… How To Winterize Your Garden In The Fall.
More Fall Gardening Tips
- How To Prepare Your Vegetable Garden For Winter
- How To Protect Plants From Frost Damage
- When & How To Plant Bulbs In The Fall For Spring Flowers
- How To Preserve A Carved Pumpkin & Tips To Make It Last Longer
Add your tips to simplify fall garden cleanup, or share your fall cleaning checklist in the comments section below!
Dudley Serapio says
I simply wanted to thank you for these marvelous tips and tricks you are showing at this website.
Amy Andrychowicz says
You’re welcome, glad you enjoyed them! 🙂
MJS says
Ha, all these years I let my garden go until spelling of the next year. My sister alway cleaned out her garden beds in the fall and would not have to do a dang thing in the spring except watch her gardens grow and plant new stuff to grow.
So this year I decided to do the same thing. So Saturday, Sunday, And Monday I worked so hard clearing all the dead stuff away from the front of the house. My house faces north and that’s the area that snow melts last. By the time I can get to it, I discover all that my spring bulbs are suffering under all the dead and water logged foliage from the previous year. So I think it was a good thing to totally clear that out. But I like the idea of putting down some leaves to decompose until spring.
But after reading this great bill of arrival, I think I’ll leave all the flowers in the middle of the yard just be, leaves and all until next spring. So thanks!
Amy Andrychowicz says
You’re welcome! I hope your gardens will look amazing in the spring after all of your hard work to clean them up this fall. 🙂
Shirley Wood says
Our flower beds are in a mess right now and in need of attention. I always mulch them this time of year with the leaves.
Amy Andrychowicz says
Haha, my gardens are a mess right now too! Fall is such a busy time of year!
Carole @ Garden Up Green says
My leaf blower is the wind and that seems to work pretty well in the country. It’s the pine needles that just stick around but they make great fire starters and I do use some in fall decorating. Great tips and for me just a little bit of effort each days goes a long way and a lot less stressful than trying to get everything done in one day. Enjoyed!!
Amy Andrychowicz says
Haha! That seems to work for my neighbors too, cause all their leaves blow right into my yard. That’s ok, cause I need them for the gardens anyway. 😀 Doing a little bit of fall garden cleanup every day is an excellent idea, and something I should try to remember every year! LOL!
Julie says
Great tips, and you have said the truest thing about gardening ever “Gardening is not one of those hobbies where you can control every little detail” ain’t that the truth!
Amy Andrychowicz says
Haha, yes it sure is! 😀
RD@Wetland Planting says
Thanks for the tips. It can be a really heavy task to clean a garden especially during fall. Cleaning seems easier if you know some techniques.
Amy Andrychowicz says
You’re welcome!
Laura @ RYG says
One of our neighbors purchased not a leaf blower exactly, but an actual machine that you push that blows the leaves. On an 1/2 acre lawn, my husband had the leaves blown over the fence and into our raised beds in about 7 minutes. It was unreal. And my husband felt so manly operating this machine. We’re still undecided if we’re going to be lazy and just let them decompose, stuff them into our composters or put them into bags and let them break down. But ugh, you are so right, Fall bogs me down, I just want to finally watch a few movies and bake a pie and there is such work to do! And with the cost of eggs these days, we’re actually considering getting chickens!
Amy Andrychowicz says
Wow, that leaf cleanup machine sounds amazing!! The great part about the leaves is that you can just leave them in your garden until you decide! They’ll still be there in the spring. 🙂 Yes, I know what you mean about all the work there is to do in the fall. This late fall we’ve been having this year has been both a blessing and a curse. It’s nice to have all this extra time to get stuff done, but I’ve been really dragging it out. I’m just ready for it all to be done! I have thought about getting chickens too, we eat a lot of eggs and the organic, cage free eggs are very expensive to buy. Maybe some day.
Mike the Gardener says
Cleaning up the garden is admitting that the season is over. Unfortunately it does come to an end and the garden must be cleaned out right? Me and my 2 sons just pulled everything out.
One great thing about this time of the year, is getting the leaves that are falling and mixing them right into my soil.
Amy Andrychowicz says
Yes, fall is definitely one of the hardest times of the year for us gardeners! I just spent a few hours this weekend collecting the fall leaves from our yard (and the neighbor’s yards – hehe) to put into my garden beds! Love it!
MJS says
Yeah this is a hard time for me. I hate watching my garden die, although admittedly, I’m so over gardening when the dog days of summer hit and it seems like even my toughest full-sun flowers are begging for relief from the relentless heat and humidity. But the early fall kind of gives everything a short reprieve and many of my perennials and annuals seem like they spring back even if for just a little while. So yeah I just wish we could have a longer, more mild growing season before the endless days of winter arrive.
Amy Andrychowicz says
I feel your pain! Fall is always a hard time for me too. 🙁