5 top tips for autumn gardening

November 8, 2022 | Garden goss | 5 minute read

As temperatures drop and daylight hours shorten, spending time in your garden might not be as appealing as it was a few weeks ago. Soggy leaves and miserable-looking plants aren’t quite as beautiful as the spring and summertime blossoms and blooms, after all. However, now is the time to prepare your garden for the winter and look ahead to next year. No one knows this better than Holkham’s Head Gardener Mark, whose team are working hard to ensure that the Walled Garden will look amazing when the gates reopen in March. In this journal, Mark gives his top five tips for autumn gardening to help your outdoor space look its best now and into next year. Get your gardening gloves, jacket and wellies on — the you of 2023 will thank you!

Sow the seeds for a spectacular spring garden

Autumn is the season to plant bulbs to produce the colourful planters and beds we all love to see in early spring. Combine tulips with alliums and crocuses to give you a continuous bloom throughout the spring months.

You can also sow sweet pea seeds. The cool temperatures allow for long, gentle germination and provide an extra few months of growth so that by next summer, the plants are stronger and bigger. Sow your seeds into pots and pop them into a porch or unheated greenhouse to keep them cool but not as cold as in the elements outside.

Look after your lawns

After the hot, dry summer, most lawns are now looking the luscious shade of green that you’d expect. To keep it healthy now is a good time to scarify the lawn using a tine rake. With long, thin, spread-out tines, these gather leaves and moss, removing the dead layer while not causing damage to the lawn itself.

Some lawnmowers allow you to change the cutting height. If you can, raise the height of your mower so that you are not cutting the lawn as low as usual. This stops moss from growing, keeping the grass healthier.

If any areas are looking bare, re-seed these now for a beautiful lawn come spring.

Split your favourite perennials

Everyone loves a freebie, and splitting perennials is the ideal way to gain more of what you love without the cost! Now is the perfect time to do this since the ground is still warm and the plants are becoming dormant. Lifting, splitting and replanting them as part of your autumn gardening allows time for the root systems to settle before the ground freezes over winter.

Why not team up with a fellow gardening buddy and swap plants with each other?

Be mindful of overwintering wildlife

Here’s an autumn gardening tip which requires no work at all! Your garden is a habitat and home for a huge number of creatures, many of which can struggle to find food during the colder months. Consider not cutting back perennials and other flowers which have gone to seed until spring. Skeletal seed heads can provide interest in your winter garden and can be beneficial for overwintering insects to hide in. They also give birds food to sustain themselves during the season.

If you’d like to do more to support overwintering wildlife, you can purchase bird seed and birdhouses in the gift shop.

Grow your own

Give garlic, shallots, and broad beans a head start for spring by planting them now.

You can easily grow garlic from a bulb you might pick up in the supermarket to cook with. Simply split the cloves off and plant them in individual pots just below the surface of the compost. Leave them in a porch or greenhouse for now, and by the end of January, you will be able to plant these outside.

For shallots and broad beans, it’s best to purchase seeds or shallot sets (immature shallots). Choose a hardy broad bean variety such as Aquadulce Claudia or De Monica (pictured below). This will give an early crop in May.

Keep up to date with what Mark and the gardening and landscaping teams are up to on Instagram.