Why a Little Preparation Now Pays Off Later

There is a particular kind of quiet that settles over a country garden in late November. The borders have slumped, the last leaves have come down, and the light has that low, silvery quality that warns of a cold night ahead. It is tempting to retreat indoors with a cup of tea and leave everything until spring. Yet the hours you spend in the garden now, while the soil is still workable and your fingers can still feel the secateurs, will repay you many times over when the worst of the winter bites. Frost, wind and water are the three great destroyers of gardens, and all three can be managed with a few straightforward tasks carried out before the first hard freeze.

Protecting Pots, Containers and Tender Plants

Terracotta and glazed pots are among the most vulnerable things in any garden. Water seeps into the clay, expands as it freezes, and a favourite pot can split cleanly in two overnight. Move what you can under cover, or at least against a sheltered south-facing wall where the masonry radiates a little warmth. Anything too heavy to shift should be raised onto pot feet or bricks so it never sits in a puddle of frozen water. Wrap the outside of large containers with bubble wrap or hessian, tied with twine, and consider sinking smaller pots into the ground up to their rims for extra insulation.

• Group pots together in a sheltered corner – plants protect one another and the mass holds warmth.
• Double-wrap terracotta, which is far more frost-prone than plastic or glazed stoneware.
• Drape horticultural fleece over tender specimens such as pelargoniums, fuchsias and olives on nights forecast below about minus two degrees.
• Lift dahlias, cannas and gladioli corms once the foliage has blackened, dry them off and store in trays of dry compost in a frost-free shed.
• Water sparingly through winter; soggy compost in a cold pot is a death sentence.

Pruning and Tidying: What to Cut and What to Leave

Pruning in autumn is a job that rewards restraint. The general rule in a British garden is to prune deciduous trees and shrubs while they are fully dormant, from leaf fall to late February, but never when the wood is actually frozen. Sharp, clean cuts heal best, so sharpen your tools and wipe the blades with a little methylated spirit between plants. Apples, pears, roses and most hedging respond well to winter attention. Stone fruits are the great exception: cherries, plums and peaches should be left until summer, because pruning them now leaves wounds open to silver leaf disease.

• Leave the seedheads of teasels, sedums, eryngiums and ornamental grasses standing – they feed birds and look magnificent in frost.
• Resist cutting back early-flowering shrubs such as forsythia, lilac and philadelphus, or you will remove next spring's buds.
• Cut back shrub roses by roughly a third to prevent wind rock, then finish the job properly in late winter.
• Tidy fallen leaves from around roses and fruit trees to reduce the carry-over of blackspot and other fungal problems.

Lawns, Beds and Soil

Give the lawn one final cut with the blades raised to around four centimetres, but only if the grass is dry and there is no frost in the ground. Walking on frosted grass bruises the blades and leaves black footprints that linger until spring, so keep foot traffic to a minimum and consider laying a simple board path to the shed or greenhouse. Autumn is the ideal moment to aerate compacted turf with a garden fork and to top-dress with a sandy loam, so that winter rain drains away rather than pooling.

On the beds, spread a generous mulch of well-rotted manure, compost or leaf mould over bare soil. A layer five to eight centimetres deep insulates the roots beneath, suppresses weeds and feeds the worms that will work it in for you. Never dig ground that is frozen or waterlogged, and leave the heavy lifting of structural pruning and transplanting until the soil is dry enough to crumble in your hand.

Insulating Taps, Pipes and Other Practical Jobs

Burst pipes are the most expensive winter accident in any garden, and almost all of them are preventable. Find the internal stop valve that feeds your outside tap, turn it off, then open the outside tap to drain any water left in the pipe. A foam tap jacket costs very little and takes seconds to fit, while exposed pipe runs in sheds, garages and outbuildings should be lagged with foam tube or wrapped in old towels and secured with tape.

• Clear leaves and moss from gutters, downpipes and drains before the heavy winter rain arrives.
• Check water butts are empty enough to take the winter flow, and disconnect hoses from the tap.
• Inspect tree ties, stakes and rabbit guards, loosening any that have grown tight against the bark.
• Wash greenhouse glass on a mild day so the low winter sun reaches your plants, and line the inside with bubble wrap insulation, leaving ventilation gaps on warmer afternoons.
• Keep a bag of grit or coarse sand in the shed for icy paths – but never use rock salt on beds or lawns.

Remember the Wildlife, and the Bones of the Garden

A frosty garden is still a living place. Put out bird food and a shallow dish of fresh water, keep it thawed on freezing mornings, and leave a corner of long grass and a small log pile undisturbed. Evergreen structure – clipped box, yew, holly, and the handsome bark of birches and dogwoods – comes into its own once everything else has gone. Before you head inside, stand at the window with that cup of tea and look at what you have done. The garden is tucked up, the taps are drained, the pots are wrapped, and spring is already quietly on its way.