15 Fall Cleanup Tasks for Your Baltimore County Lawn and Landscape

Do you enjoy raking leaves and cleaning out gutters on Saturday and Sunday? Do you know all of the outdoor chores that you need to finish by the end of November?

In this blog, you’ll learn about 15 tasks that you need to do for your Dundalk lawn and landscape to survive winter.

15 Fall Cleanup Tasks for Your Baltimore County, MD Lawn and Landscape

As summer slides into fall, it becomes apparent that you need to work outside to get your lawn and landscape to bed for the winter. Here are those 15 fall cleanup tasks that you need to finish well before Thanksgiving:

1. Cleanup leaves: You need to rake up all leaves, so they don’t smother your lawn grass buried underneath them. If you allow leaves to pile up, your lawn grass is in danger of fungal diseases and death.
2. Mow and trim weeds: You still need to mow your lawn until the grass stops growing, which is usually in late November. 
3. Winterize your sprinkler system: It’s time to call your sprinkler system contractor to close up your lawn sprinkler for the winter. You don’t want pipes to burst when temperatures dip below 32°F.
4. Dethatch and aerate your Lutherville-Timonium lawn: Fall is the perfect time to get all the thatch out of your lawn grass. Remember, half an inch of thatch is safe, but your turf can harbor insects and diseases if thatch grows beyond a half-inch.
5. Overseed your White Marsh yard grass: Maryland lawns have cool season grass that grows best in fall.  Autumn is a perfect time to overseed your yard grass before it stops growing for the season. Get your grass seed in now so that it has time to develop robust root systems before winter.
6. Clean out your gutters: While gutter cleaning doesn’t affect your lawn and landscape directly, it’s still part of routine fall cleanup jobs. You protect your home and roof by cleaning out your gutters of leaves, sticks, and other debris.
7. Add winter fertilizer to your Perry Hall lawn: Your lawn grass needs that last bit of nutrition before winter arrives. Winterizer gives your yard grass essential minerals that help the root system grow hairs to reach into the deepest part of the soil for moisture and nutrients.
8. Check your soil’s pH and apply lime or sulphur to your lawn: You can buy soil test kits from your local extension office or at your garden center. Follow the directions for the soil test. Once you get the results back, you’ll need to add sulphur to make your soil more acidic, or you’ll need to add lime to make your soil more alkaline.
9. Clean out your flowerbeds: While it may seem like a waste of time, you’re benefitting your gardens when you pull weeds and add mulch to them. You may want to chop up leaves and put them on your beds over the winter.
10. Take out summer bulbs, split perennials as well as plant fall bulbs and annuals: If you planted caladiums, dahlias, elephant ears, and other spring-planting bulbs, you want to dig them out and put them in a dark, dry place over winter. It’s also a great time to split perennials that overgrew their current spot. If you want to add some early spring color, it’s time to plant those fall bulbs, such as crocus, snowdrops, daffodils, and tulips.
11. Cut back dead or diseased tree and shrub branches: While you don’t want to prune your trees and shrubs after August, you should cut away any branches that are dead or diseased.
12. Winterize your ornamental trees and shrubs: Horticultural oil protects your woody plants from insects and egg sacs overwintering in them. Also, you can wrap your trees and shrubs to protect them from the cold.
13. Add a fresh application of mulch to your Overlea flowerbeds and landscape: If you have less than four inches of mulch on your flowerbeds and landscape, then you want to add another inch or two for the winter. Mulch helps regulate soil temperature, protects plant roots, and keeps moisture in the soil longer.
14. Drain your hoses, fountains, and drip irrigation: It’s time to close off the outside waterlines. You also want to drain your hoses, fountains, and drip irrigation so that water doesn’t freeze in them over the winter.
15. Clean your gardening tools: You also need to drain the oil and gas out of your lawn mower and clean your gardening tools. Put them away in a dry place until next spring.

Learn more: Why your lawn needs mowing until the end of November.

Learn more: Why your lawn needs core aeration and overseeding.

Get Your Weekends Back When You Hire Ground Control Lawn Care to Cleanup Your Lawn and Landscape This Fall

While you want these jobs done by November, you know that your weekends are busy shuttling your kids to soccer and football games. Plus, you want to catch Saturday and Sunday football games during your downtime.

So, you can still enjoy your fall weekends when you hire us at Ground Control Lawn Care to take care of your fall yard jobs. We provide the following services:

• Aeration and overseeding
• Dethatching
• Leaf cleanup and removal
• Lawn mowing
• Mulch
• Sod installation.

If you’re ready to hire a lawn care professional for your Baltimore County property, call us today at (443) 520-5646 or fill out our contact form. 

Read more: 8 questions you need to ask your Baltimore County Lawn Care company before you hire them.

At Ground Control Lawn Care, we serve the following Maryland cities: Bowleys Quarters, Carney, Essex, Lutherville-Timonium, Middle River, Overlea, Parkville, Perry Hall, Rosedale, and White Marsh.

Sources:

Alamanac.com, “10 Fall Cleanup Tips for a Better Spring Garden.”

Safewise.com, “The 15 Must-Dos of Fall Yard Cleanup.”