Spring Cleaning

Wiese Acres Tulips

In addition to trimming the ornamental grasses back to make way for their new growth, the rest of the gardens need to be cleared of dead foliage and winter mulch soon.

It's important to remove any straw, leaf or other mulch that covered plants to protect them for the winter, before the spring dampness causes mold to start growing and before the plant begins its active spring growth cycle.   If mulch is left too long, growth starts, but is very anemic and susceptible to sun and wind damage from being left in the dark too long.  When you remove the mulch, that tender new growth is damaged and may die back.  That doesn't always kill the plant, but it does set it back.  And after a long, cold, dreary winter, I sure don't want to wait even longer to see my beauties begin to perform their summer rituals again.

If the straw mulch that I used for winter cover is still in good condition,  I rake it off to the side to use for mulching the walkways in the vegetable garden,  or around the raspberries and blackberries, to suppress weed growth over the summer.

I really like years when the snow melts early enough before new growth starts that I can get into the perennial beds with my push type lawn mower.  I make sure the blades are good and sharp and set to about 2 inches high.  I remove the tougher, larger stalks like daylily scapes and other lily stalks.  Then, I take the mower and run across all the remaining dead foliage several times, until it is chopped fine.  It makes a nice, compostable mulch and saves a tremendous amount of work.

If I can't get in with the mower, I knock down as much of the dead foliage as I can with a rake, use a sharp trimmer to cut the rest, rake it into piles, and carry it off to the compost bin.    You can see that it is a lot more work this way, so I always hope for the mud to dry before new growth begins.

I also trim back spirea shrubs to the ground each spring.  This keeps their growth habit nice and compact, and makes for a cleaner, neater looking shrub that can really show off its beautiful leaves and flowers.  Potentilla also get cut back to the ground every couple years to keep them from getting too lanky and other summer or fall blooming shrubs get whatever pruning they need.  Spring-blooming shrubs, such as forsythia or lilacs, should only be trimmed immediately after they finish flowering.  These shrubs begin to set the buds for the next year's blossoms over the summer.  Trimming them too late in the summer or in the spring will prune away next year's show.

While spring cleaning isn't my favorite job in the garden, I love it when it is all done and things are neat, clean, and ready to burst into a brilliant field of greens and other beautiful colors.