Naked Gardens

Has anyone else felt their gardens were naked after cutting back all the dear stuff before winter? Mine looks so forlorn!

I do leave the seed heads of the coneflowers for the winter birds, but almost everything else gets cut down.

I don't think of it as forlorn, instead it seems peaceful and relaxing, ready for a long winters nap.

Naked here. LOL But I'm ready for the break.

I'm ok with them being naked for the winter. But I always feel like I am losing good friends during the clean up process of taking out the dead annuals and cutting back the perennials. Thank goodness that the first seed catalog arrived two days ago!

darius, probably not proper technique, but I leave so much in the garden except for annuals and veggies "up" as we get a good snow cover here and we just like the look. But right now except for the roses -- yup, lookin' pretty nekked!

Definitely naked here too :-(....It makes me sad.

I have 6 plants of mums blooming and 4 crazy rose bushes with about 20 flowers each on them. I think this is the most color I have ever had at the end of October. Everything else is so buried under leaves, straw, and mulch I couldn't see if it was still blooming.
I do have about 15 paper bags over the tops of things that I am still hoping to retrieve seeds from, so I haven't quite gotten to that feeling barren spot yet, I am sure it is not far away.

Dea, we get scant snowfall here, and cannot count on snow as a winter cover. Hence, I cut most things back.

My mums have finally started blooming so all is not lost in the yard!!!

It's weird here, somethings are dying back, and it's raining leaves, while the temps remain in the 80's and other things are coming back and doing well.

"eyes"

I agree with "eyes", it's wierd here. I have blooms on roses, a coreopsis, morning glories, cypress vine, cosmos, and lantana in full bloom. The temperature was 90 yesterday, yet it's raining leaves and some things are beginning to die back.
Fall is in the air!

I cut everything down over last weekend. Makes me think we northern gardeners are nuts.. We spend all winter planning, all spring planting, summer fertilizing and pruning and moving plants around - and then in the fall we cut it all down ! That's a lot of work for four months of bloom ! Not that I am ready to quit doing it, you understand.

You are funny, HoneyGirl... and hit rhe nail right on the head, LOL.

I finally put my gardens to bed yesterday. For northern VT, it was a balmy day, and the forecast rain didn't come til last night.

As I was cutting back perennials and pulling up dead annuals, my first thought was "oh my, how naked and spindly everything looks" My next thought was "oh my, how many seeds to harvest!", and my final thought was "Great, now this is done and I just need some snow so I can pursue my winter passion".

Funny how we know when we are ready to accept the inevitable. Last week, I couldn't bear the thought of putting the beds to sleep for the winter, because I wasn't ready for it myself.

I don't do "naked" in the winter. I take out the dead annuals and cut the taller plants down to 2 feet or so. I leave the mums & other plants intact. The seeds and leftover vegetation help the birds & small animals in the winter months. The vegetation also helps insulate the plants from our freeze/thaw spring temps.

I love cleaning the beds in April when everything is turning green again.

"naked" beds? not yet. I still haven't had a frost, so almost all my annuals are still thriving. Trees are a mixed blessing. I just have to pull all the fallen leaves off my beds to find the things blooming under them. I hope to finish before March 15th this time. Maybe I oughta start another contest? Pond won last time -- I finished my fall clean up on March 20th. Started my spring garden cleaning the next day.

Hey Kathy! WELCOME BACK!!!!!!

I too feel like my garden is naked, untill I got out today and started looking around....

No garden with that mound of hot color is naked!

I agree with Zany!

I was putting dirt and bark mulch around the bases of my few tender roses yesterday, but I had to be careful not to break off the flowers - this has been a most strange year. I have a lunaria plant blooming! There is really a lot of flower power out there yet despite the snow we had in early October - pasies and violas, annual phlox, gaillardia, cerinth, arctotis, chrysanthemums, species petunias verbenas, great lobelia, sedums, lavender, allysum, wall flowers, pinks, snapdragons, the hellebores are starting, field daisies, feverfew, malva, asters, geraniums, million bells, broccoli, calendula. I'll clear the rubble away in the spring!

Everything green is still growing, here. My delosperma, ice plant is growing an half an inch a day.

Tho, the blooms are gone on nearly evertything the greenery is lusher than ever. And there are still blooms on my purple daylily.

Good time to consider shrubs for winter interest. Shrubs do compliment perennials and annuals.

Boxwoods are popular now. They are evergreen, and can be shaped and designed into the landscape.

True !LOL ! Its been a strange year, I now have other mums blooming when i was sure they were not going to. Its cold here at nigt but last week it was in the low 70's during the day. I guess tha's why My mums arent doing as well as usual. I will post more pics to show you what I mean.