Read the season before you reach for the tools

By the time the clocks go back, most UK gardens have already had a taste of what is coming: gales from the west, rain that arrives sideways, and the first sharp mornings that leave the lawn crunchy underfoot. Winter damage rarely comes from cold alone. It comes from the combination of wet roots, soil that freezes and thaws repeatedly, and wind that rocks plants loose in ground that never quite drains. A few focused days of work now will carry far more plants through to spring than any amount of fussing in January. Start with a slow walk around the plot, notebook in hand, and look for the spots that stayed soggy last year, the pots that cracked, and the shrubs that leaned.

Clear fallen leaves, but not all of them

Leaves left thickly on a lawn will smother the grass, encourage moss and leave yellow patches that linger until April. Rake them off regularly rather than waiting for the last one to fall, and pay particular attention to paths, steps and gully gratings, where wet leaves become genuinely dangerous underfoot. A leaf blower is useful on gravel and decking, but a spring-tined rake does less harm to borders.

Do not treat every leaf as rubbish. Bagged in a bin liner punched with a few holes, or stacked in a wire frame, damp leaves rot down into leaf mould in a year or so, and it is one of the finest soil conditioners you can make. Keep it separate from the compost heap, which runs hotter and faster. Sweet chestnut, oak, beech and hornbeam break down well; sycamore and horse chestnut take longer but still get there.

• Clear leaves from alpines, small bulbs and low-growing herbs, where they cause rot.
• Leave a shallow pile in a quiet corner for hedgehogs, frogs and overwintering insects.
• Empty gutters and downpipes before the heavy rain arrives, and check water butts are stable and covered.

Insulate pots and containers

Anything growing in a pot is far more vulnerable than the same plant in the ground. Compost in a container freezes solid from the outside in, and the roots die long before the top growth shows any sign of trouble. Terracotta is the worst offender: water soaks into the unglazed clay, expands as it freezes and splits the pot clean open.

Move what you can against a house wall, ideally in a sheltered corner that catches some warmth, and group pots closely together so they shield one another. Raise each one onto pot feet, bricks or timber offcuts so it never stands in a puddle. Remove saucers entirely for the winter, and reduce watering to a minimum — damp compost in cold weather is a killer, so water only on mild, bright mornings when the compost is genuinely dry.

Wrap the outside of vulnerable pots with bubble wrap, hessian or an old blanket, or slip the whole pot inside a larger one with a gap between. Finish with a layer of bark chippings or gravel over the compost surface to keep the rain off and stop the crown of the plant from rotting. Any container that is already cracked, or too heavy to move, is best planted up with something reliably hardy and left to it.

Tidy perennials without stripping the garden bare

Herbaceous perennials need different treatment depending on how they behave. Anything that collapses into a slimy heap after the first frost — hostas, hardy geraniums, daylilies, most pulmonarias — is best cut back to the ground now, with the debris cleared away rather than left to harbour slugs and disease.

Anything with seedheads or architectural stems should be left standing. Sedums, echinacea, teasels, cardoons, grasses and the skeletons of honesty all hold their shape through winter, look superb rimed with frost, and feed the birds. Cut them back in late February or March, just as the new shoots appear.

Around the crowns of prized plants, mulch with two or three inches of well-rotted compost or bark, but keep it clear of the stems themselves; mulch piled against a crown traps moisture and rots it. Tender tubers — dahlias, cannas, begonias, gladioli — should come out after the first light frost, be dried upside down for a few days, and be stored in barely damp compost in a frost-free shed or garage.

Protect against wind and standing water

Check tree ties and stakes before the gales arrive, and loosen any that have become tight around a swelling trunk. Thin out dense evergreens if they are catching the wind badly, and shorten long, whippy shoots on roses and buddleias by about a third to stop them being wrenched about — save the proper pruning for late winter. Shelterbelts of woven willow, or a simple net screen, break the force of the wind far better than a solid fence, which simply funnels it over the top.

Where soil stays waterlogged, fork it over gently to open it up, add grit or coarse bark, and if the problem is persistent, plant in raised beds or mound the soil around the roots. In the greenhouse, keep vents slightly open on mild days to prevent damp air sitting on leaves, and remove any plant that has started to rot rather than hoping it will recover.

Small jobs that pay off in spring

Give the lawn one last cut on a high setting, then keep off it during frosty spells; walking on frozen grass bruises the blades and leaves brown footprints behind for months. Wash and oil hand tools before they go away, sharpen the secateurs, and drain hoses and irrigation lines so nothing splits. Empty and clean seed trays, and store them somewhere dry.

Finally, keep feeding the birds, leave a shallow dish of water that is checked daily, and resist the urge to tidy every last leaf and stem. A slightly scruffy winter garden is a living one, and come March you will be glad of the insects, the structure and the soil you protected back in October.