On Sun, 17 Nov 2002 20:59:37 +0100, "Robert Simpson"
wrote:

My garden is in late-autumn-mode with lots of plants having brown stems, and
many with seed pods at the top. Normally I would cut all this off and feed
the compost (or the local container park, as we call it in .be). But I have
seen (on GW?) that some people leave it alone since it prevents the garden
looking so barren over the winter. If I do this what happens next spring
when new shoots try to grow? Is there a time that I MUST cut it all down?

There are three schools of thought about when to cut down dead
perennials, the Fall-Winter school, the Winter-Spring school, and
the nihilists in the No-Cutdown school.

If you think your garden looks better in winter with all the dead
growth intact, then by all means leave it until late winter or
early spring (but not so late that the new growth is starting to
emerge -- if you leave it that late, you are a nihilist).

Myself, I've never made my mind up. I'm mostly nihilist, but I
try to tidy the garden bit by bit during the winter by cutting
down the worst looking dead bits.

--
Rodger Whitlock
Victoria, British Columbia, Canada