Preparing for Winter

People do lots of different things to feed and take care of their soil, plants, and lawn before winter. Some in-season feeding I discussed a few days ago, here. It's the beginning of October now, and in Indiana that often means time to get the garden ready for winter. Some people plant fall vegetables in their garden in August and September here (check out some tips on fall vegetable gardening), but I did not this year. Instead I mulched my bed with grass clippings, and I plan to continue to cover it with clippings for the rest of our mows this season.

Here is a short video on how I mulched my garden bed this fall:


I read a really great article on gardening and it talked about mulching around plants. Of course I conveniently did not read it until the end of the season. The good thing about the article is that I learned several things I can prepare next spring. Check it out: 5 Secrets to a 'No-Work' Garden. One of the things they talk about is the importance of mulching to feed the soil and take care of the plants. While my garden is now plant-less, I thought it would be a good idea to mulch it anyway to give it a cover for winter and let the mulch nurture the soil.

What do you do to get your garden and lawn ready for winter? Do you plant any fall or winter plants? Also, what resources do you find are really great for gardening over all? I found the article above to be so helpful that I plan to start following the Earth Easy blog. I also depend on a friend of mine who is a gardener and likes to try new gardening tools and methods, and I depend a lot of my dad, who has been vegetable gardening successfully and taking care of a large lawn for a long time.