12 Fall Garden Tasks Every Gardener Should Do Before Winter: Your Composting Checklist

As summer gives way to cooler days, it's time to prepare your garden for the changing season. Fall is one of the best times of year to improve your soil, divide perennials, plant trees and shrubs, refresh mulch, clean up garden beds, and get a head start on a healthier spring garden. It's also the perfect opportunity to compost fallen leaves, spent plants, and kitchen scraps, turning everyday yard waste into nutrient-rich soil instead of sending it to the landfill.

No matter the size of your outdoor space, these fall gardening tasks will help protect your landscape through winter and set the stage for healthier plants, stronger blooms, and bigger harvests next year. If you're looking to build healthier soil from the ground up, start with What Is Healthy Soil? before tackling your fall garden checklist.

1. Feed Your Compost Instead of Filling Trash Bags

Autumn is composting season! Instead of bagging leaves, faded flowers, dead annuals, and garden trimmings, use them to build nutrient-rich compost. Fallen leaves are an excellent source of carbon, while spent vegetables, plant clippings, and kitchen scraps provide nitrogen. Aim for roughly three parts brown materials to one part green materials. Shred leaves when possible to speed decomposition and improve airflow throughout the pile. What to compost:

• Fallen leaves

• Dead annual flowers

• Vegetable vines

• Herb stems

• Garden weeds before they produce seed

• Fruit and vegetable scraps

• Coffee grounds

• Eggshells

Avoid composting diseased plants, invasive weeds with mature seeds, or meat and dairy in a backyard compost system. New to composting? Our Tips Beginner Composters Need to Know will help you avoid common mistakes before you get started.

2. Leave Some Leaves for Wildlife

Not every leaf needs to be raked. Many native bees, butterflies, moths, fireflies, salamanders, and beneficial insects spend the winter beneath leaf litter. Instead of removing every leaf from your yard, leave a thin layer beneath trees, shrubs, and native plant beds where it can naturally decompose and provide valuable habitat.

Collect excess leaves from lawns and pathways for compost while allowing natural areas to continue supporting local biodiversity. Wondering whether leaves should become compost or leaf mold? Learn the difference in Compost vs Leaf Mold: What Is the Difference and Which Should You Use?

3. Add Compost to Garden Beds

Finished compost is one of the best soil amendments you can apply before winter.

Spread one to three inches across vegetable beds, flower gardens, around trees, and throughout perennial borders. Earthworms, microbes, rainfall, and natural freeze-thaw cycles will gradually incorporate nutrients into the soil over winter, improving structure, water retention, and fertility before spring planting begins. Healthy compost also increases microbial diversity, helping plants access nutrients more efficiently throughout the growing season. If you're unsure how much compost to spread or where to apply it, our guide to How to Use Compost for a Healthier Garden walks through the process step by step.

4. Plant a Cover Crop

Bare soil is vulnerable to erosion, nutrient loss, and compaction. Cover crops help protect the soil throughout winter while adding valuable organic matter. Many legumes also fix atmospheric nitrogen, naturally improving soil fertility for next year's crops. In spring, simply cut the cover crop and allow it to decompose or incorporate it into the soil before planting. Cover crops are one piece of a larger regenerative approach. Learn more in Regenerative Gardening for Beginners.

5. Divide Overgrown Perennials

Many perennial flowers benefit from division every few years. Fall is an excellent time to divide:

• Coneflowers

• Black-eyed Susans

• Daylilies

• Hostas

• Bee balm

• Yarrow

• Ornamental grasses

Replant divisions around your landscape or share extras with neighbors, schools, libraries, or community gardens to expand pollinator habitat without purchasing new plants.

6. Save Seeds from Your Best Plants

Allow healthy flowers and vegetables to mature completely before collecting seeds. Excellent candidates include:

• Sunflowers

• Zinnias

• Cosmos

• Beans

• Peas

• Tomatoes

• Lettuce

• Native wildflowers

Store seeds in labeled paper envelopes in a cool, dry location for spring planting or donate extras to your local seed library.

7. Clean Up Diseased Plants

While many plants belong in the compost pile, diseased material should be handled differently. Remove plants showing signs of severe fungal diseases, bacterial infections, or viral symptoms before winter. Cleaning infected material helps reduce disease pressure the following growing season. Healthy plants can continue feeding your compost pile.

8. Mulch with Natural Materials

Mulching protects soil from temperature extremes, reduces winter weeds, and helps retain moisture. Excellent natural mulch options include:

• Shredded leaves

• Finished compost

• Straw

• Pine needles

• Wood chips around trees and pathways

As these materials slowly break down, they continue feeding beneficial soil organisms. Already have old mulch in your landscape? Read Old Mulch Piling Up? Don't Throw It Away before replacing it.

9. Care for Your Worm Bin

If you vermicompost indoors, cooler weather is a great time to give your worm farm a seasonal checkup. Harvest finished worm castings if the bin is becoming full, fluff compacted bedding to improve airflow, and add fresh carbon-rich materials like shredded cardboard or paper. Continue feeding smaller amounts if household food waste decreases during the cooler months. Healthy worms continue producing one of nature's richest soil amendments all year long. If you're just getting started, our Worm Composting for Beginners guide covers everything you need to know about raising healthy composting worms.

10. Plant Native Species

Fall offers excellent planting conditions for many native trees, shrubs, grasses, and wildflowers. Cooler temperatures reduce transplant stress while allowing roots to establish before summer heat returns. Native plants also support local pollinators, improve biodiversity, require less irrigation once established, and provide food and shelter for wildlife. Pair new native plantings with compost to improve root development and long-term soil health. Adding compost around native plants isn't always recommended. Learn when it helps and when it can do more harm in Should You Add Compost to Native Plants? It Depends on Where They Naturally Grow.

11. Test and Improve Your Soil

Autumn is the ideal time for a soil test. Understanding your soil's pH, nutrient levels, and organic matter content allows you to make targeted improvements before spring arrives. Adding compost after testing naturally increases soil organic matter while improving water-holding capacity, microbial activity, and overall plant health. Healthy soil begins with understanding what is already there! Unsure whether your garden needs more organic matter? Watch for these Signs Your Soil Needs Organic Matter before making amendments.

12. Start Planning Next Year's Garden

Winter arrives faster than most gardeners expect. Take photos of this year's garden, note what performed well, record pest issues, and sketch next year's planting plan. Rotate vegetable families to reduce disease buildup and incorporate compost application into your annual garden schedule. Thoughtful planning now leads to healthier plants, higher yields, and fewer surprises next season.

About Let’s Go Compost

Let’s Go Compost is a national nonprofit making composting simple, affordable, and accessible. Our programs bring hands-on composting to communities, helping people turn food and plant waste into healthy soil that supports food systems, native plant ecosystems, and pollinators. Learn more at letsgocompost.org and support our work at letsgocompost.org/donate.