Let It Be

Be smart, indulge yourself and click the vid, you know you want to!

Autumn is upon us and although I'm hardly Mother Mary I do have some words of wisdom on the subject of your garden and what is to be done with it at this time of year. Many gardeners feel compelled to clean up their garden and make everything look neat and tidy. Well don't, get a grip and Let It Be!
Sure you can remove the fallen leaves from your paths as they get slippery when wet as we certainly don't want you to break your neck. But put those leaves in your borders or in big plastic bags to make leaf mold. Do not throw them away or even worse blow them away with that most stupid and totally unnecessary of garden gadgets the leaf blower. Just get yourself a broom which is far less noisy, cheap, doesn't waste fuel and a spot of brushing away the leaves will give you a free work out too.
Any branches that will blow about in the wind and would perhaps poke out your eye in the process, well give those a good trim. Remove pots that are not frost proof and put them somewhere save, this also applies to plants that cannot stand frost. Put out food and water for the birds and that's pretty much all you have to do in your garden.
Do not start a scorched earth policy in your garden. Most plants do not require to be cut back to the ground so Let It Be. All those fallen leaves in your borders? Ditto!
If you do have an autumn clean in your garden you will also be cleaning away hiding places for beneficial insects that overwinter in the garden debris. You'll be chucking out pure black gold aka leaf mold that will feed your plants next year. You'll also be removing food for the birds and places for hedgehogs, toads and many other garden friends to hibernate in.
Fallen leaves provide many plants and bulbs with a nice warm blanket when its cold outside, bitterly cold. Remove said blanket and you'll have a good chance of losing more plants and bulbs than when you had just Let It Be.
If your fingers are itching to clean something up, go give your kitchen cupboards a good clean, they could probably do with one. And, which is even better, give mine a good scrub while you're at it. But your garden? Let It Be!
Because next spring you will most certainly need your garden friends to help you get rid of many pests and diseases but if you've destroyed many or most of them, well ....... you do the maths.
And there's another good reason to Let It Be. Do you think that the above garden would have looked half as good if some overzealous person had cut the grasses and plants down to the ground? Frankly, tidy is overrated!
Do you really want to rob yourself of pure winter magic as shown in the pic above? Of course not, so Let It Be.
But Mother Ma.... er YE I hear you mumble, don't you never ever clean up the garden then? Well yes, come Spring you will brush away the leaves in your border which will be fun, not a chore as the brushing is very much like unwrapping presents. You will come upon so many unexpected treasures that you will be grinning from ear to ear for most of the time spent giving your garden a light Spring clean.
Come Spring there Will Be No Garden Sorrows as you garden friends will be ready, willing and able to give you a hand. Or a wing, or a tentacle, or a beak as the case may be.

These whispered words of wisdom were brought to you by the Beatles and yours truly.

copyright 2009 Y.E.W. Heuzen