Although the arrival of winter means the end of gardening across much of Canada, in British Columbia's Lower Mainland it's not uncommon for locals to be outdoors with trowels and rakes throughout the fall and winter.

A few tips from Alan Reid of GardenWorks:

• • The first area he likes to address is soil. A spring and summer of growing can exhaust or deplete the nutrients in soil. And soil is like wine –  the longer it ages, the better it gets, said Reid. Adding rich soil to your garden now makes it a productive growing environment by springtime.
• • He recommends 100 per cent organic soils such as steer or mushroom manure and suggests people avoid the use of chemical fertilizers.
• • Remember to plant your spring-flowering bulbs in October. Reid also suggests reseeding your lawn at this time of the year. With all plantings, bone meal is a great organic fertilizer to use.
• • Almost every gardener spends time raking leaves. Those leaves are often thrown into bags and left at the curb. Reid sees a problem with that because those leaves are just filling up our landfills when they can be put to good use as mulch in the garden. Leaves protect plants and soil nutrients during the winter. They also add vital nitrogen and phosphorus.

Check out the rest of the story for more great gardening tips.

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