If you haven’t yet done it, now is the time to remove the stems of herbaceous peonies, cut down stalks of tall perennials like Phlox and Monarda, and shear the leaves from Siberian iris. You’ll thank yourself in the springtime when you’re trying to figure out what is planted where. Is there a deadline for all of this activity? Not really. It’s really a matter of comfort—your comfort—while working outside. I’d rather wait until the insect population dies down and I don’t have to wear sunscreen. However, it’s up to the gardener to think about what her garden needs are to get through the winter.

Predicting the Weather?

Winter in the Midwest comes down to lowest historical temperature. An important resource for any gardener is the United States Department of Agriculture’s Plant Hardiness Zone Map. This tells you how cold it has gotten over the past several years. To pinpoint your USDA Hardiness Zone, go to the interactive zone map site, a handy tool to help estimate how cold it could get. Another handy guide that uses historical data to predict with some accuracy when it will get nippy is the Old Farmer’s Almanac. It gives the potential first frost or light freeze date.

I found a great article on the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) website that gives probability of first snowfall based on your location. It’s based on records between 1981 and 2010. NOAA also offers a site for true weather geeks that gives the U.S. Climate Normals in the 30 years between 1981 and 2010.

Meanwhile, NOAA offers the following definitions of frost and freeze:

• Frost: The deposition of ice crystals directly on the surface of exposed objects. In the right conditions (clear skies, winds less than 6 mph) frost can occur when observed air temperatures are several degrees above freezing.
• Freeze: When observed air temperatures fall to 32 F or lower.
• Killing Freeze: When observed air temperatures fall to 30 F or lower for at least two consecutive hours.
• Frost Advisory: Issued when frost is forecast to occur at 3 or more observation sites in either group 1, 2, or 3.
• Freeze Warning: Issued when a freeze is expected to occur at 3 or more observation sites in either group 1, 2, or 3.

Bringing in The Hose

There are certain items we use throughout the summer that fall into the “support” category. These are the things we reach for constantly, the workhorses of the garden. Because of the location of my outdoor spigots and the size of my garden, I have a few hundred feet of hose. Bringing in the hose can be a conundrum in a year such as this. There are potted plants that are still blooming and therefore need an occasional drink of water. But leaving the hoses out in mid-November leads us down a slippery slope, not to mention a major tripping hazard.

When the trees dump their leaves in earnest, they hide a potential danger that lurks beneath them. These dangers include hose guides, elevation changes, and hoses. One year I had to shuffle through a six-inch layer of leaves in order to find where I’d neatly coiled 200 feet of hose in preparation for bringing it inside. I’d wisely wound it up after detaching it from the spigot, but was too tired to bring it in after wrestling it into submission on a cold morning that turned the pliable rubber into an unyielding, inflexible pipe.

In case you’re thinking of leaving the hose attached to the outdoor spigot through the winter months, don’t. While I always knew it was a bad thing to leave a hose attached in winter, I never knew why until I saw this video that explains it. It boils down to ice, and once it begins to form inside the hose, pressure builds, and the ice has nowhere to go, causing it to possibly crack a part of the indoor piping, flooding your basement or crawl space.

Cutting Requires Heavy-Duty Shears

Cutting a whole garden full of plants down is a tough job. “It’s a good thing it’s cold out,” I told myself as I gathered my sharpest shears. I kept my hand pruners on stand-by and went for the Fiskars long-handled hedge shears. When choosing a pair of shears, I go for lightweight, and start with the long-handled shears just to cut things down to a size I can manage. For some plants, like ornamental grass iris foliage, and most annuals, it’s all you need.

My cutting arsenal wouldn’t be complete without Bacho Long-handled Lawn Shears. These are the ones that come in for the close-to-the-ground cuts—peony stems, and anything with an upright demeanor. The handles on these shears are long enough to clip without bending, which makes them a back-saver.

For thicker branches, I love the Radius Pro Loppers (//radiusgarden.com/collections/cutting-tools/products/pro-lopper?variant=10824626753). They’re light in weight and make precise cuts close to the main stems of woody plants. And speaking of woody plants, don’t forget to wait until very late winter (between January and March) before pruning trees and shrubs. If you prune these plants too early in the fall, there is a chance they’ll form new growth that can be frozen. Besides, it’s really a lot easier to see what you’re doing once the leaves are gone.

Storing the Non-Cold Hardy

As desperate as we are for color in our winter landscape, it’s not a good idea to leave some of our ornaments outdoors to suffer the rigors of winter. Glass gazing globes and most clay pots should be brought indoors and out of harm’s way for the winter.

There are some planters that can get through the winter without damage. Containers made of fiberglass and plastic are pretty tough and can be left out—a good thing because they can get heavy with a full load of potting soil. Inexpensive plastic pots become brittle with age. I’ve coaxed an extra year out of them by dragging them in close to the house onto the concrete patio where they are covered by a deep overhang.

I don’t expect anything to survive in the planters I leave out for the winter. Plants I can’t do without I will dig up and store in the garage. I’ve collected several pineapple lilies (Eucomis) that are reportedly hardy to Zone 7. Since winters are unpredictable here at the southern tip of Lake Michigan, I bring them, pots and all into the garage, and place the pots on top of a sheet of Styrofoam to help insulate the root ball. The roots are what need to be protected, after all.

This summer, I experimented with breathable fabric pots in which I planted my Eucomis and other non-hardy plants that I wanted to save. I planted the Eucomis, fabric pot and all, in a large container, leaving the handles and about an inch of the top of the fabric above the soil line. This made it easy to pull the fabric containers out in the fall, and stack them loosely into a lightweight container that I lined on the inside with bubble wrap.

A Word (or two) About Mulching

Whether you make your own mulch by mowing up the fallen leaves, or buy it in bags, timing the task is important. Applying a thick layer of mulch over plants that are still actively growing in late fall tells their roots to keep on working. I consider Thanksgiving a good signal to mulch away. Of course, I have so many trees around my garden I don’t have to mulch, there are plants that require their own individual treatment.

If you don’t have the benefit of fallen leaves, you’ll want to check your coral bells (Heuchera), which are just waiting for an excuse to pop out of the ground. The phenomenon is called frost heave, and some plants are more susceptible than others. The best way to prevent heaving is to follow these guidelines:

• Mulch no more than 3-4 inches deep
• Keep the mulch away from the crown of the plant (Typically at the center of the plant; the point from which the leaves and stems grow).
• Apply the mulch after a hard frost. (See “Predicting the Weather”)

One last thing to consider when trying to talk yourself out of dealing with the dead stems is how your garden will look in spring when the bulbs come up. Nothing detracts from a spring bulb display more than a bunch of dead stalks looming over the sprightly blossoms. You did remember to plant bulbs, right?

IF YOU’RE REALLY INTO WEATHER DATA:

The NOAA Regional Climate Center has a page from which you can extract historical last and first days that temps dipped below 32 degrees F. It’s not user friendly, so NOAA Weather Forecaster Julie Dian-Reed from the Ohio office gave me the parameters to use:

Single Station: First/Last Dates

Options Selection: YEAR RANGE: POR-2016 (this means Period of Record)

Criteria: Min Temp < 32

Period Beginning: July 1 (this keeps your requests near the ‘growing season’)

Station Selection: You need to narrow by the Chicago office. No- unfortunately it’s not alphabetical by city name, its alphabetical by office ID — Chicago’s ID is LOT