I belong to the 'chop and drop' school: composting in place. Leaves go straight onto the beds after they're shredded, as mulch. Dead heads fall under the plants.

I made a compost heap of the twigs and leaves from a tree that fell, and the big piles of grass clippings after the 10" rain. Cold compost takes longer, but I'm not turning bales of brown and green.

Underneath everything here is cow manure and composted gin trash that came from the gin already composted. Use what is most readily available to you and least expensive. Gin trash was free -- hauling was dear for a semi-load!

Nell

I'm with Nell. Cheap and cheerful everytime!! My prunings are left were they were trimmed - unless there is so much as to be unsightly. I have a mulching mower, and do not rake leaves. I do a bit at a time, shooting them through the mower into the garden. This spring, I got a load of really well composted manure free, and hauled it home in my truck - that is when that little truck pays for itself!! I have a lot more trees here, as opposed to my old home. This Spring, I built a composter out of old skids. I filled it 3 times with leaves, and it also gets the vegs garden remains. This will move come spring back to the veg garden. I will buy garden soil this fall, but that will be for my new lasagne garden.
And that is how you get lovely flowers. This house's gardens aren't quite there yet, but they will be....it will take a couple of years. I do use a granular fertilizer - CIL Pink, for the flower gardens. It says its organic. Soil is a good thing to be obsessed with, Anne. Show us your garden - it's probably not as bad as you make it sound!!!

Nancy.

I also do a lot of chopping in place especially things like ferns, although I haven't used it in awhile I have a small electric chipper and quite often the chips get thrown back on the garden if my 6 compost bins are full.
We are fortune enough to have a product called Sea Soil made right here on Vancouver Island, I sometimes top dress with this in the fall after I've finished weeding a spot, love the stuff.

Annette

I use whatever is cheap and plentiful. These days I am very lucky as I have made friends with a horse farm owner and I get a composted mix of bedding and manure. I get it by the truckload and topdress in spring. The plants love it.

There's another thought that came to me about soil. We posted in another thread about taking soil samples, and many of us do not. Despite that fact, we do pay attention to soil needs.

I have an extension service list of plants that 'like lime,' even to the point of which prefer how high a pH. On occasion, I go around with a little bucket and give certain plants a little spoonful of lime. Over time, I've learned who likes a little bit of magnesium and sulphur -- those get a bit of Epsom salts. A scant handful of wood ashes helps some alkaline lovin' shrubs who need extra potassium.

It's kind of like making biscuits without measuring: after a while, you know just how much of what goes in. If the biscuits turn out badly, you know to return to a recipe.

Clay soil is noted for acidity. Pine straw mulch and shredded oak leaf compost add to it. If you grow wonderful azaleas and Philadelphus languishes, it may be more than just needing to add humus.

Nell

PS - I've read it's best not to mulch in the fall, because you make a nice warm place for bugs to overwinter, and a nice soft bed for mice and voles.

Also, if you can, delay mulching in the spring until early summer, because by allowing your soil to warm up, it kills fungus and other pathogens. Mulching too early keeps soil cool and the diseases linger.

See notice from the renegade gardener. His site can be difficult to navigate, but is full of lots of gems. Look under the "don't do that" link and the select archives at the bottom, then scroll down to: Don't put mulch down around perennials until June 15.

Here is a link that might be useful: renegade gardener

I totally suggest some sort of soil test, even if it's a little one from the hardware store.
A friend in my neighborhood has the strangest soil. I figure that someone who did an el-cheapo renovation on their home used some sort of fill dirt to "fix" the grade. The soil just wasn't working with amendments. Her soil test garnered a huge long list of necessary things from the Extension office - she had no mineral content, no potassium, little nitrogen, and no micro-nutrients. The tip off there was lack of worms.
So now she buries small piles for composting directly in the garden: shredded paper mixed with food waste (just little "lumps", makes leaf mold, has a larger compost bin for garden waste, coffee grounds and restaurant waste (a local eatery will give us green for composting), collects grass from neighbors etc. It's beginning to work!! We did a compost tea drench and she has worms!

GGG

Renegade Gardener is a fun read. Some of us (in the warmer zones) need to remember that he gardens in Minnesota. If we in the south wait until June 15 to mulch, most everything will be toast in the hot sun that started back in March. Winter mulch here kind of mediates the extreme days, up and down.

Brenda, being a slightly warmer climate I haven't had any trouble with mulching in the late fall, my perennials poke through without any problems that I can see. We don't have trouble with mice or voles doing damage in the garden, touch wood, but this does give me some food for thought. Thanks for the link, looks like a lot of very sensible advice.

Annette

Thanks for your wonderful suggestions - I continue to be inspired by y'all (as they say here in the South, of course).

midnightsmum, I swear I'm not fishing for compliments, my garden looks good in places but I have a lot of area outside my front picket fence that needs soil improvement. Before I work on that area I want to improve what I already have and learn better skills for managing good soil.

Look for the photo "View of House from the Street". I have a rather large corner lot in an old neighborhood. Actually, many years ago some thoughtful neighbors got the whole neighborhood designated as historical to save it from the Atlanta airport expansion.

The Renagade gardener helped get me started on this soil obsession - he wrote that soil quality is 95% of gardening.

Here is a link that might be useful: My Garden Pictures on Photobucket

omg - Anne - you have hardscape to die for!!!! You also seem to have a lot of dry shade. That could be problem #1. Think about a soaker hose system, or Plan B, sprinklers. You are at the perfect stage to put them in....and I would go with soakers. With this system, you can put specific drips in for pots as accents. Just my opinion. You can have great soil, but without water, nada. You can have lots of water, without good soil, you're still going to have flowers, shrubs, etc.

Cheers, Nancy.

Anne, your gardens are wonderful. Love all the different paths, rocks, arbors, fences, etc. Just a perfect setting for cottage gardens. I would say from looking at your plants that you are doing something right! I think things look great.

Having loose, friable soil means a great difference in plant growth. For example: I just planted out two cuttings of the rose 'Aloha'. One went in the light pole garden where digging is easy; one next to the porch where the previous own had a "mulch" of white gravel (don't get me started on that!) and you need a pick axe to dig. Guess which one looks the best? I should just dig up and replant the rose before it succumbs.

Nancy, You are right on - a whole bunch of dry shade in the front (faces North) with compacted soil filled with tree roots. I will install a drip system since sprinklers are so wasteful and we are still in a very serious drought in North Georgia. Right now there isn't much to water outside the picket fence but this is where I will be expanding my garden. Some of the trees will be removed too and a few smaller ones planted to replace them.

GGG, maybe today I will go and get one of those soil kits. I suspect some plants will do better with some lime added to the planting hole but I need to find out for sure. I can't exactly explain why I've been so reluctant to test my soil, I guess I fear bad news.

Glenda, you hit the nail on the head! I want the good soil everywhere and right now I'm limited by places where the ground is like cement. I want everything to look its best wherever I put it. Greedy, huh? Greed has led me to soil obsession. I feel like there's no use going further without doing something about my soil.

I have dug up plants to move them and found their roots had not expanded much at all due to the poor soil :-(

Thanks for the encouragement,
bloominganne