Your November Gardening Checklist
November on the allotment is a month of preparation, protection, and late-season harvesting. Frosts are more frequent, daylight is short, and the soil is often damp—but there’s still plenty to do to keep your plot productive and ready for spring.
No time to rest!
There’s just enough daylight to clear and tidy the allotment of any old crops in preparation for next year. Don’t leave the remains of summer crops to rot and harbour overwintering pests and diseases. Please wait for a clear, crisp, sunny day and go for it. You might feel worn out, but you’ll be a lot better at the end of the exercise—and your allotment will thank you.
Soil Preparation & General Maintenance
Clear spent crops – Remove any remaining vegetables and annuals, compost healthy material and dispose of diseased foliage.
Dig and mulch beds – Fork over vacant soil, incorporating compost or well-rotted manure to protect soil structure from frost and erosion.
Protect bare soil – Cover it with garden fabric, cloches, or fleece to prevent nutrient leaching and damage from heavy rain.
Tidy paths and borders – Rake leaves, remove weeds, and edge borders to save work in spring.
Check water systems – Drain hoses, turn off taps, and store irrigation equipment safely for winter.
Vegetable Tasks
Winter cabbage, Brussels sprouts, leeks, and parsnips – Harvest these hardy crops. Wait until after a frost for parsnips; the chilling converts starches into natural sugars, producing a sweeter flavour.
Brussels sprouts – Pick from the bottom of the stalk upwards so all sprouts swell. Snap off yellowing leaves to improve air circulation and make harvesting easier on cold, wet days.
Leafy greens – Continue harvesting kale, winter spinach, chard, lamb’s lettuce, and other hardy leaves. Protect crops with cloches or fleece if frosts are severe.
Garlic & onions – Finish planting garlic cloves and overwintering onions before the ground freezes.
Broad beans – Transplant pot-raised beans to a sheltered spot; early-month sowings can still be taken if protected from frost.
Potatoes & root crops – Lift late maincrop potatoes and hardy roots such as carrots, celeriac, and Florence fennel before hard frosts. Leave parsnips in the ground under mulch until after frost.
Brassicas – Cover cabbage, Brussels sprouts, and kale with netting or fleece to protect from pigeons, slugs, and frost damage.
Fruit Tasks
Plant new fruit trees and bushes – November is an excellent time to establish new fruiting additions. Soft fruit bushes can also be moved if needed.
Autumn-fruiting raspberries – Cut old canes to the ground after fruiting; these plants bear on new wood, so trimming encourages fresh growth.
Take hardwood cuttings – Fruit bushes are easy to propagate now and can produce decent-sized plants in a few years.
Apples & pears – Check storage conditions regularly, and remove any fruits showing signs of rot.
Soft fruits – Mulch around dormant berries to protect roots from frost.