By CHRISTOPHER KAZARIAN
Autumn on Cape Cod is idyllic. There’s less traffic, the beaches are not as crowded, and temperatures are more tolerable.
There may be no better time of the year to get outside and prepare your yard for a long winter’s nap. “I love the fall. It’s the best time to work,” said Robert DeMelo, owner of DeMelo Brothers Inc., a landscaping firm based in Marstons Mills. “It is cooler and you get a sense of old Cape Cod. Autumn is my favorite time of year to do anything. It is a sign of the slowing down of the season. It’s almost like a break from the craziness of summer.”
As to where to begin with your fall lawn care, Mr. DeMelo recommended letting nature take its course.
With flower beds, “leave it to the leaves,” he said. “People are under the impression that you need to clean the leaves out of your planting beds. No. Leave the leaves there. It is a food source for the insects and all those creepy crawlers we need to aerify the soil. It is going to look a little messy, but it’s more important to keep Mother Nature healthy than removing them for aesthetic purposes.”
With grass, he suggested taking a similar tack by mulching the leaves, if possible, because it will feed the soil and is an eco-friendly approach to lawn care.
Now is also the ideal time to plant and transplant plants, Mr. DeMelo said, emphasizing the need to give them plenty of water before the ground freezes. “Use compost when planting,” he added. “Use the gooey material under the leaf layer. The plants love that.”
Landscapers can add value to their fall yard projects, he said, because they have the necessary equipment to do work in a timely and efficient manner. “If you’re doing some big planting or big moving of plants, you’ll probably need some help with that, from someone who knows what they’re doing and how to cut a root ball and when to cut a root ball,” he said.
If a homeowner decides to go with a landscaper, Paul Miskovsky, owner of Miskovsky Landscaping in Falmouth, said they should make sure the landscaper has sufficient time to address the homeowner’s needs because “so many are just flat out” right now.
He advised most pruning to be done in the early spring versus the fall. “In some cases, if we get an early spring, it can force plants into a false growing season because pruning is a stimulating process,” he said. “A lot of times when people cut things back, they set things back.”
Aerating lawns—and slice seeding weaker ones—should be done in the fall. “To give it a bump, use any number of starter fertilizers,” Mr. Miskovsky said, noting that they all have chemicals, but organic ones are less invasive. Adding compost, such as Coast of Maine, which doesn’t contain a lot of weed seed, is another step to prepare your yard for the colder winter months and the eventual spring season.
He is a strong proponent of using leaves for composting as opposed to putting them in trash bags. There are landscapers who can remove them quickly and at a relatively low cost with commercial leaf vacuums.
Having started his company 38 years ago, Mr. Miskovsky said, he continues to enjoy working with clients in creating the outdoor spaces of their dreams. “This is really fun, creative, nice work,” he said.
It was a similar perspective from Bob Hoxie, who has owned Hoxie Landscape Services in Sandwich since 1986. “I like working with plants. I like maintaining them, being creative with how to use them and being connected to the environment,” he said. “We live in a beautiful location on Cape Cod. It has a unique microclimate. We do not share weather with any other place in New England. It is very unique and nice to be in tune with all of that.”
Perhaps no time of year allows people to feel more connected to the outdoors than the fall. “It’s a great time to prepare your lawn for the spring,” Mr. Hoxie said. “We say from Labor Day to Columbus Day is the best time to perform these kinds of maintenance and improvement activities on your lawn.”
He agreed that now is when people will want to aerate and seed their lawn, with the dividends showing up next spring.
It’s also when people will want to put in new plants. “It can get a little tricky if you plant things late in the season where they are exposed to very windy conditions during the winter,” he said. “Putting something in that hasn’t developed a root system yet, you run the risk of it being damaged by the winter conditions.”
Many nurseries often liquidate their plants in the fall, making it attractive for customers who are looking to take advantage of lower prices. Before purchasing them, Mr. Hoxie said, people should ask staff how long the plants have been there. “In the fall, you are buying plants that may have been in the nursery all year. It might have been dug from its original location in April and you’re buying it in October,” he said. “The plant is already in a weakened condition, and because you’re planting it late in the season, it can result in the loss of a plant because it is already very stressed.”
Homeowners will also want to make sure they are putting the right plant in the right place when adding it to their yard. This is another value that a professional can bring to your outdoor project as they can identify the proper place for plants and sequence them so “they are flowering from spring through summer so something is always happening and there’s always something nice on the property,” Mr. Hoxie said.
One of the rewards of his career has been guiding people in getting outside, working on their yards and having the confidence to make many of these decisions on their own. “For many, it is a hobby and it is fulfilling,” he said. “With so many things, people tell me all the time, ‘I like to plant things that are low-maintenance.’ What they’re really saying is ‘no-maintenance.’ The big thing I teach them is that doesn’t exist. There are things that are slower-growing, but everything grows. If it’s not growing, it’s dead.”
These next few months are when homeowners can take the proper steps to ensure their lawn and plants can not only survive the winter but also thrive next spring. That work should begin today. “The fall is truly the best time of the year,” Mr. Hoxie said, especially for those who enjoy gardening and being outdoors.
Mr. DeMelo, who also teaches horticulture at Cape Cod Regional Technical High School in Harwich, agreed. “You have the fresh air. You get to clear your mind and your mental state,” he said. “Being outside, whether you’re in a big field or working in a garden, being around plants, you’re nurturing something. You’re creating something, and you feel good about what you’re doing.”