Every year the cold weather sets in, and every year we find ourselves unprepared for it. Suddenly the sense of urgency, the need to ‘get things done’ before winter kicks in starts to take over, and before long things get very stressful indeed!
Hopefully though, your list of pre Winter chores has at least become a familiar one, and it should simply be a case of getting off one’s proverbial in order to do them. Before long the central heating will be back on, so if the niggling problem with the TRV valve in your bedroom is going to mean you freeze over the winter months, now would be a good time to so something about it!
As far as the garden is concerned, it’s time to ditch those wilted hanging baskets and prepare your flower beds for the cold snaps ahead, and in preparation for spring. Your lawn mower might still come in useful from time to time, especially as a leaf mulching tool, but in any case you should be thinking ahead to putting it to bed for the Winter, including draining the fuel and giving it a good clean (and dry) to prevent any corrosion setting in during its dormant months.
A hedge trimmer is still useful at this time of year, and indeed if you’ve neglected to keep your hedges trimmed over the summer in favour of other more pressing parts of the garden, now is as good a time as any to to your attention to the task of tidying up those hedges.
If you live within a short distance of one or more trees you’ll know just how vicious the onslaught of falling leaves, acorns, seeds and twigs can be. It’s worth trying to stay on top of this if possible as the debris can soon mount up to an intimidating level! A leaf blower is great for pushing leaves into a pile for easier disposal, and indeed it can also be used to vacuum them up if it has this function built in. However if you’ve go acorns and twigs to deal with, you’ll still need a rake as these are more often than not too heavy for a leaf blower to deal with effectively, and the mulching feature of a garden vac isn’t designed to be bombarded with heavy objects.
A garden shredder can be a great asset to breaking down said leaves and sticks into a more manageable consistency, ideal for creating mulch or compost, so if you do have a compost heap this is the best time of year to begin adding to it.
Remember, the work you do at this point of the year will pay off come spring, so it’s worth putting just a few hours in whilst you still can!
