December - tidying up the garden for winter

I don't put the garden to bed, but I do a brisk winter clean-up that takes me into spring.  And the hope is that these aerobic activities keep me, and my garden, in shape:

• Sweep paths and surfaces regularly. 'Open' gardens have to do this on a daily basis.  In winter I try and do all the surfaces visible from the house fairly regularly to avoid the deab, neglected look.
• Cutting hedges and overgrown shrubs down to size.  These creep up-, becoming more difficult. Sawing the thick stems back to just below the minimum optimum height is energetic work and makes annual maintenance far easier.
• Cutting back herbaceous - but only when they look scary.  I don't divide them (unless I need more).  I haveyet to find ohne that starts to die back int he centre of the clump, contrary to poopular belief.
• Adding mulch.  I have a huge heap of green compost which I apply thickly (150mm) everywhere I can.  It saves weeding, improve the soil and makes up for nutrients lost in the heavy rain.
• Washing the greenhouse.  The glass gets dirty with all the wind and rain, and if yours is anything like mine, every bit of extra light helps.  Make sure it's clean before spring.
• Gravel raking.  I freshen and redistribute the gravel ona frosty day as it's hot work.
• Turning the compost heap and spreading.  My compost has weed seeds unlike the bought equivalent.  It goes in places such as the bottom of planting pits and as mulch on my borders, or anywhere it's easy to spot and remove weeds.

Article is from Bunny Guinness in the Sunday Telegraph