5 tips help set up fall planting

I asked Jay Harper of Harper's Nurseries & Landscape Co. to provide five tips for a successful fall garden.

• The first rule of thumb is soil preparation.

That means adding a lot of organic compost or mulch to the soil to replenish nutrients and gypsum to counter alkalinity.

"Get lots of organic material turned into the soil and just keep working it until you think it's good and then do it again," Harper said.

The soil should be well-blended and have a fairly dark, rich homogenous look, Harper said. That means no clumps.

Water the enriched soil a day or two before planting. The soil should be moist, not muddy, when ready to plant.

• Evaluate everything in your yard.

Clean up plant litter and groom plants such as rose bushes of dead blooms, limbs and dead or yellowed leaves.

• Fertilize plants lightly. Harper calls it recovery fertilizing.

"That does help them recover from summer stress and grow some replacement foliage," Harper said.

• Adjust your watering schedule.

"The nights are longer and plants recover, and they don't need as much water," he said.

• Plant.

Fall is a great time to replace plants that struggled through the summer, Harper said. It's also a perfect time to add new greenery to your landscape as opposed to waiting until spring.

"The soil is still warm and the nights are cooler and plants don't stress out. It's a wonderfully good time to plant trees and shrubs and vines," Harper said.

Virtual garden: Looking for desert-adaptive plants? Both the Boyce Thompson Arboretum near Superior and the Desert Botanical Garden are hosting fall plant sales.

Boyce Thompson's runs through Oct. 26. For more information, go to ag.arizona.edu/BTA.

The Desert Botanical Garden's sale is next Saturday and Oct. 19. Go to www.dbg.org for details.

A greener thumb: You can apply a pre-emergent now through early December to prevent the sprouting of weed seeds. Do not apply in areas where you have planted wildflower or other seeds you want to grow.

Send garden-related questions, Web site suggestions and tips to Southwest Gardens, in care of Diana Balazs, The Arizona Republic Scottsdale Bureau, 8800 E. Raintree Drive, Suite 250, Scottsdale, AZ 85260; via e-mail to diana.balazs@arizonarepublic.com; or via fax to 602- 444-6875. Please include your full name and the city you live in and a telephone number. Your number will not be published.