Fall is prime time to prep your yard for next spring. Cooling temperatures slow above ground growth, and moister soil encourages strong root development. Removing spent stems, dead branches, and heavy leaf cover protects plants’ overall health.

Aerate the Lawn: If rainfall pools on the grass, it’s time to aerate compressed soil so water and nutrients can reach the roots. A garden fork can do the job on a small yard, but for larger lawns use a walk-behind aerator that pulls out 2½-to 3-inch-deep soil plugs, which will break down naturally by spring.

Feed Your Grass: Grass roots keep growing until the ground gets down to around 40 degrees, so this is a good time to feed them. Apply a high-phosphorus (12-25-12) mix to lawns in fall to encourage roots, so turf greens up earlier in spring.

Mow a Final Time: Trim turf down to 1¼ inches for the last cut of the season. Disease has a harder time with shorter grass, and fallen leaves blow across the lawn easier. Don’t go too low, though: Grass makes most of its food in the upper blade.

Collect Leaves: To make fallen leaves easier to transport, rake them onto a plastic tarp. Add them along with leaves from the gutters to a compost bin. Flip the leaf pile every week with a garden fork to aerate; the “black gold” that results next year can nourish lawns, flower beds, and shrub borders.

Plant New Shrubs: Planting shrubs in early fall gives the plants a head start at establishing roots in the season’s cool, moist soil. The basics: Dig a hole twice the diameter and to a depth of 2 inches less than the full height of the root ball; position the shrub in the hole so the root ball remains at, not below, ground level; fill in with soil; water to settle soil; add more soil to top of root ball (don’t pack soil down with foot); mulch.

Trim Dead Limbs: Dead branches often succumb to winter snow and winds, endangering you and your home. For big jobs, call in the pros. However, you can protect small trees from further damage by cutting cracked, loose, and diseased limbs close to but not flush with the trunk; leave the wounds exposed to heal.

Cut Back Perennials: A little work now results in healthier spring beds: Evict tired annuals, as well as the snails and slugs that feed on them, which breed in fall. Trim spent perennials down to the ground to send energy to the roots. Every three years, divide crowded tuberous plants, like irises and daylilies: more space means more flowers.

Mulch Young Plants: Give new beds a layer of mulch after a light frost, but before the ground freezes. Till decomposed layers of organic mulch into the soil, then apply a fresh 2- to 4-inch layer to keep new plantings warm and to control water runoff and soil erosion.?