Everything You Need To Know About Keeping Your Garden Clean

Every gardener knows that keeping the garden clean is an important disease-fighting technique. Gardeners who practice good garden sanitation not only have fewer problems with diseases, they'll also cut down on pest and weed problems as well. And while keeping a garden clean is a great deal easier than keeping a house clean, it does require some of the same attention to detail.

Do an annual cleanup. Inside the house, it's traditional for the major cleaning effort to come in the spring. Out in the vegetable garden, you should plan to concentrate your cleanup efforts in the fall. At the end of the growing season, routinely remove and compost all plant stalks. Lift plastic mulches and either dispose of them or save them for the following year. Even if you don't plan to use them for plants in the same family next season, form the habit of dipping plastic mulches in a 10% bleach solution (1 part bleach to 9 parts water) and letting them air-dry before rolling and storing.

In the orchard, the time for the annual cleanup is late fall to early winter. You'll want to make an end-of-season inspection tour and pick up all fallen fruit, which may harbor diseases over the winter. Also, shake down any stray fruit and rake up fallen leaves for composting. Check your trees for damaged or dead limbs and prune them out.

In the flower garden, rake mulch back from plant crowns in fall so they won't be exposed to the cold, damp conditions that promote crown rot. If you've had previous problems with diseases, it's a good idea to remove the mulch completely. Once the ground has frozen for winter, you can add new mulch to protect plants from frost heaving, but be sure to keep it away from the crowns of the plants. You may want to wait until late winter to cut back annuals, perennials, and ornamental grasses, because they can add ornamental interest throughout the winter.

Don't leave diseased plant foliage in the garden. Remove and destroy it in fall. Be sure to cut back healthy ornamental foliage well before growth starts in spring. Sterilize stakes and other supports by dipping them into the bleach solution as well. Give all tools a final cleaning by rinsing them in the bleach solution. After they're dry, wipe the metal parts with a cloth soaked in machinery oil to protect them from rusting over the winter.

Keep in mind that soil on shoes, tools, clothes, and hands can carry disease organisms from plant to plant or area to area. For this reason, it's a good idea to wait until the end of your gardening day to work in diseased portions of the garden. This way, you won't inadvertently carry pathogens from one place to another.

Change clothes before moving from a diseased plant or area to a healthy one, and sterilize your tools in a 10% bleach solution after working on diseased plants, or you could end up transmitting diseases from one part of the garden to another. Cleaning your shoes can be tricky, but there are ways to manage. Rubber soles and tops or even rubber soles with quick-drying canvas tops are the easiest to sterilize.

If you've been working in a part of the garden where diseases are a problem, scrape off any clinging soil into a bucket that will be dumped in the trash (not in the garden) or buried far away. Swish the shoes in the bleach solution, scrubbing off any soil with a brush if necessary. If you live in a humid climate, it may take more than overnight for your shoes to dry, so you'll need two pairs of gardening shoes. The same caution on washing your shoes applies to your clothing. If diseases are present in the garden, it is a good idea to wash your gardening outfit between wearings.

Clean your tools regularly. After a long afternoon spent tending the yard and garden, it can be tempting to simply toss the tools you've used into the shed and shut the door. However, it is necessary to wash and sterilize your tools after every use, you will be doing all the plants in your care a favor. Your tools may have come in contact with a diseased plant material without you realizing it. If you don't clean them when you put them away (which is the best course of action for the health of your tools, too), clean them before you start to work the next time.

This applies to tools that you borrow from the neighbors as well; always sterilize a borrowed tool before using it in the garden. To clean your tools, simply dip them into a bucket containing a 10% bleach solution. Wipe them off with a clean rag, let them dry thoroughly, and then apply a coat of light oil to all metal parts.

Always inspect new plants and seedlings before planting them in the garden. Look closely for signs of rot, damaged stems or leaves, fungal hyphae or spores, or leaf spots. Inspecting perennials for disease is sometimes difficult. Some symptoms are just too subtle to see without a microscope. However, if you buy only certified perennial stock from reputable nurseries, you have some assurance that the plant is disease-free. You can plant it where it is meant to live out its life and remove it if it does manifest disease symptoms.

In the case of gift perennials or those dug from a friend's garden, you might want to plant those in a temporary site, away from the main garden beds, where you can observe them for any disease symptoms. Once you feel comfortable issuing them a clean bill of health, you can transplant them to their permanent location.

You have less risk of importing disease on purchased annuals, because most greenhouses buy good seed, plant in sterile media, control the environment carefully, and destroy flats of plants with disease problems.

Nearby wild areas, such as stream banks, and waste areas, such as vacant lots or construction sites, may be reservoirs of disease organisms that could migrate into your garden. Many common weeds belong to the same botanical families as some of your garden plants and may suffer from some of the same diseases. Walk through these areas routinely.

Gather any diseased plants you find and dispose of them immediately. If you have had problems with disease on your cabbage family plants in the past, you may want to pay particular attention to removing weeds from that family, even if they do not show disease symptoms.