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It’s time to maintain your tools, organize garage

As the gardening season winds down, it’s a good time to shift your focus to preparation and maintenance. Taking care of your tools and winterizing your garden now goes a long way when spring comes around.

Sharpen tools

It’s a good idea to sharpen and clean garden tools when putting them away for the season. I like to keep my garden tools sharp because it makes the gardening work much easier.

Sharpen spades with an electric hand grinder and put the bevel (angled edge) on the inside edge of the spades. It is important to wear ear and eye protection for this task as it is noisy, and sparks will fly as the grinder is used. Move the grinder steadily back and forth to create a sharp edge and avoid burning the metal.

Garage organization

For your garage, use pegboard on the walls to hang and organize tools. If your garage is unheated, it is best to store liquids in the basement. Another tip: have your snowblower serviced before the first measurable snowfall when repair shops may get backed up with repair and maintenance work.

Continue landscaping

You can continue installing brick paths, patios and sod until the ground freezes. The same goes for planting deciduous trees and shrubs. Planting evergreens at this late stage carries some risk, especially for large evergreen trees placed in exposed locations where they’ll face sun and wind. Smaller evergreen shrubs, on the other hand, can be positioned in areas with some protection from harsh winter conditions, reducing the risk.

Beware the hungry voles

I prefer waiting until early spring to cut back my perennials. You may want to consider cutting more perennials back in the fall if you have had problems with voles. Voles are compact rodents with stocky bodies, short legs, and short tails. They can be mistaken for mice. Since they do not hibernate, they are active throughout the year, mostly at dawn and dusk. Voles eat the stems and leaves of various grasses, but they also consume other vegetation. During the winter, they will gnaw on the bark of trees and shrubs, which is usually the most severe damage to worry about. Gardens with low-lying landscaping, such as arborvitae, spreading yews, junipers and cranberry cotoneaster have higher potential for vole activity.

Voles are the most prolific when they have abundant amounts of vegetation and cover. The damage is likely to be more severe during extended cold spells with deep snow cover. You can control the damage by eliminating weeds and dense ground cover around lawns to make these areas less able to support voles. Mow lawns and other turf regularly and cut back vegetation from the bases of trees and shrubs as winter approaches in areas where there is vole activity. Also, it is a good idea to pull mulch back away from the base of trees and shrubs and keep the snow cleared away from the base of young trees. Reducing cover makes voles more vulnerable to predators such as hawks and owls. In general, removal of cover is very effective in preventing damage done by voles. I continue to leave perennials up in my garden over winter from year to year without having damage from voles.

• Tim Johnson is director of horticulture at Chicago Botanic Garden, chicagobotanic.org.

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