Every summer resident wants not only to get a good harvest, but also to preserve perennial plants during a cold winter. For improvised means, you must go to the nearest forest park area. Valuable helpers from the forest for the fertility of your soil will help fertilize the land and create a good shelter for wintering perennials.
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Using fallen leaves
In the fall, you can stock up on a lot of fallen leaves in the forest. To do this, you need to arm yourself with a rake and bags made of natural fabric. It is advisable not to use products made of artificial materials, since they do not allow air to pass through and in them plant raw materials can quickly rot or become moldy.
It is better to collect foliage in dry meadows, slopes, forest edges. At the summer cottage, all raw materials should be scattered in a sunny place and dried. Foliage can be used for several purposes.
First of all, it can serve as a natural shelter for those plants that need warmth in winter. Experienced summer residents believe that foliage performs a much better protective function than shavings, sawdust or straw.
Collected leaves of oak, maple, linden, birch must be poured in a thick layer on the prepared ridges and leveled with a rake. From above, it is advisable to cover the landing with some dense material - polyethylene, roofing felt, several layers of burlap.
Shrubs cut off and bent to the ground should be well covered with a dense layer of leaves. To protect the root system of the berries, you can place foliage under the branches.
After the snow melts, slightly rotted leaves can be raked out, but not removed, but left directly on the ground. Under the influence of heat and sun, weeds will actively grow, but the foliage will serve as an obstacle to the growth of unnecessary species.
It is believed that winter plantings of onions and garlic are also good to cover with fallen leaves collected from the forest.
There is no need to be afraid that with such foliage some infections will be introduced into the beds. Experts say that cultivated plants are practically not susceptible to the diseases that forest trees and shrubs suffer. Decaying, the foliage enriches the soil in the summer cottage with nutrients necessary for the active growth and fruiting of garden crops.
In addition, the leaves of oak, aspen, maple contain a lot of tannins that have a detrimental effect on pathogenic microorganisms and some garden pests.
In addition to being used as a mulch, fallen forest foliage can be prepared for use in the spring as a fertilizer.
If there is a compost heap or a pit at the summer cottage, it is recommended to fill it with foliage brought from the forest, shovel it, pour it with slurry or a solution of complex fertilizers. By spring, such a heap forms a fatty, lush humus rich in trace elements. If you spread it over the ridges, you can get a rich harvest.
When there is no compost heap, you can store forest raw materials in one place of the summer cottage, and in the spring use it as fertilizer for vegetable crops.
Some summer residents harvest dry foliage in bags. In the spring, they are convenient to cover plantings of tomatoes, onions, garlic. Roses and clematis are good for such a shelter.
Using pine needles and moss
In addition to fallen leaves, you can harvest needles and moss in the forest. The former can also serve as a good fertilizer. When added little by little to heavy, loamy soils, they can become much lighter and more nutritious. In addition, fallen needles can also be used as mulch to shelter perennials wintering in the ground.
Pouring needles under garden crops, you can not only fertilize the soil, but also protect it from the growth of weeds.
Moss is no less useful in the summer cottage. It can also be harvested for the winter, removing whole sods in swampy places. Moss needs to be dried in the sun and chopped.
This forest raw material is often used to deoxidize the soil. In addition, it is ideal as a mulching agent. Moss protects plantings and soil from hypothermia, retains moisture, prevents insects from starting up and allows plant roots to breathe.
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