How to Get Garden Soil Ready for Autumn Planting

Autumn gives you something the rest of the year does not, which is soil that is still warm underneath while the air above it has cooled off. Roots keep working in that, weeds slow down, and anything you put through the bed has months to break down properly before the heavy growing starts again. So it is the best window all year to fix a tired bed, and it is worth more than whatever you end up planting in it.

Start by taking things out

Pull the spent summer crops and get the weeds out while the ground is still soft enough to make that easy. Anything left in the bed over winter is somewhere for pests and disease to sit, and they will still be there in spring when you have forgotten about them.

If a plant looked sick, it goes in the bin rather than the compost heap. The heap will not get hot enough over winter to deal with it and you will just spread it back through the garden next season.

Then put things back in

Soil that has grown a summer crop has had the goodness pulled out of it, so this is the part that actually matters.

• Compost or well rotted manure. Through the top 15 centimetres or so. It feeds the plants, but more to the point it fixes the structure, which is what holds water in a sandy bed and stops a clay one setting like concrete.
• Blood and bone or a pelletised manure. Slower release, which suits autumn because you want the nutrient still there in six weeks rather than all used up in one flush.
• Seaweed. Not a fertiliser as such, it works on the root system and helps things settle after transplanting, so it is worth having on hand when the seedlings go in.

Water it in and give it a week or two before you plant if you can. Fresh manure and a young seedling are not a great combination.

Then cover it up

Mulch is the job people skip because the bed already looks finished without it. It holds the moisture in, keeps the weeds from getting a run at the bare soil, and stops the temperature swinging around as the nights get cold. Sugar cane or pea straw both break down into the bed over the season, which means you are feeding the soil twice from one job.

Keep it back off the stems of anything already growing, because mulch packed against a stem holds damp there and rots it.

What it looks like when it has worked

You will know next season rather than this one. A bed that got the autumn treatment holds water longer through the hot months, needs less feeding on the run, and grows things that do not sulk every time the weather turns. It is not the interesting job and it is the one that decides how the rest of the year goes.

Come and have a look

The garden centre at the shop has the compost, the manures, the mulch and the seaweed, so you can do the whole bed in one trip rather than three. If you are not sure what your soil actually needs, come and tell us what it does when it rains and we will sort you out from there.

Shop related products

• Brunnings Garden Compost with Seaweed 25L. The first thing through a tired bed.
• Brunnings Blood & Bone Based Fertiliser 5kg. Slow release, so it is still working in six weeks.
• Neutrog cock-a-doodle doo 20kg. Pelletised, easy to spread, and it does not smell the place out.
• Martins Organic Sugar Cane Bale 11KG. Mulch that breaks down into the soil.
• Martins Organic Pea Straw Mulch 11Kg. Same job, and it adds a bit of nitrogen as it goes.
• Seasol seaweed concentrate 1L. For when the seedlings go in.

There is more in the garden centre range, and the Neutrog gear is here.

Read next

• What to Plant in Autumn in a South Australian Veggie Patch
• How to Make Compost at Home Without It Going Wrong
• A Beginner's Guide to Building Good Soil for Your Vegetable Garden

Mulch is the job I am most likely to talk myself out of, because by then the bed already looks finished. Do it anyway.

Cheers,
Candeece