Crisp Mornings and the Turning of the Year

There is a particular sort of morning on the allotment in October that makes the whole year's work worthwhile. You arrive just after eight, the grass path is silvered with dew, and the air smells of damp earth and woodsmoke drifting over from somebody's incinerator. The gate hinges squeak in the cold. A robin, bold as brass, lands on the handle of your fork the moment you turn the first spadeful of soil.

Autumn is the allotment's gentlest season. The frantic sowing and watering of high summer are behind you, the weeds have slowed to a crawl, and the plot settles into a rhythm of gathering in and tidying up. It is also, quietly, one of the most productive times of year — what you do now will shape next summer's harvest. A flask of tea and a pair of decent gloves will see you right.

Bringing In the Pumpkins and the Last of the Beans

If you have grown pumpkins or winter squash, the priority is getting them cured before the first hard frost. Cut each fruit with a good length of stalk — a couple of inches at least — and never carry them by it, as the stem is the first place rot sets in. Wipe them clean with a dry cloth, then leave them somewhere warm and airy for ten days to a fortnight, a sunny windowsill or the greenhouse bench being ideal. When the skin has hardened to the point where a fingernail won't dent it, they will keep for months in a cool, dark shed. Varieties such as 'Crown Prince' and 'Harlequin' store beautifully.

Elsewhere on the plot:

• Lift maincrop potatoes before slug damage and blight get any worse, and leave them to dry on the surface for a few hours before bagging.
• Pick the last runner and French beans, or leave a few pods to swell for next year's seed.
• Cut down sweetcorn stalks once the cobs are taken — they make excellent compost material.
• Gather green tomatoes and ripen them indoors in a paper-lined drawer, or turn them into chutney with a few windfall apples.
• Check stored onions and garlic weekly, and remove any that are starting to soften.

Clearing Spent Crops and Feeding the Soil

The temptation in autumn is to leave the plot be, but bare soil over winter is a wasted opportunity. Rain leaches nutrients away and the structure slumps under the constant battering. Clear spent crops methodically instead: haul out the brassica stumps, pull the finished courgette plants, and shake the soil from the roots back onto the bed.

Do check brassica roots for the swollen, distorted lumps of clubroot before you compost them — if you find it, burn the roots rather than adding them to the heap, and avoid growing brassicas on that spot for several years. Tomato and potato foliage showing signs of blight should also go in the bin, not the compost bin.

Everything healthy can go onto the heap, layered with torn cardboard, scrunched paper and a sprinkling of soil. Then cover the cleared ground. Spread well-rotted manure or garden compost over the surface and let the worms pull it down over winter, or sow a green manure such as field beans, grazing rye or phacelia to protect and enrich the soil. Winter tares are a fine choice for beds that will take hungry crops next year.

Planting Garlic for Next Summer

Here is the job that makes autumn feel like an act of faith. Garlic needs a cold spell to split into properly formed bulbs, so planting now — ideally between mid-October and the end of November — gives you the fattest, best-flavoured heads next July.

Choose a sunny spot that hasn't grown onions or garlic for at least three years. Break a bulb into individual cloves, keeping the papery skin intact, and plant them pointed end up, about two inches deep and five or six inches apart, with a foot between rows. Firm them in gently. It is worth buying proper seed garlic rather than using supermarket bulbs, which are often treated to stop them sprouting and may carry disease.

Softneck varieties such as 'Solent Wight' and 'Cristo' store for months and plait beautifully; hardnecks like 'Purple Moldovan' have a fiercer flavour but a shorter shelf life. A mulch of compost will keep the frost off, and a few sticks or netting over the bed stops the birds from tugging the cloves out before they root. Plant overwintering broad beans such as 'Aquadulce Claudia' alongside, and you will have something to look at all winter.

Small Jobs and Small Pleasures

The shorter days are perfect for the jobs you never quite got round to in June.

• Clean and oil your tools, and plunge spade and fork blades into a bucket of sand and oil to keep them rust-free.
• Wash the greenhouse glass to let in every scrap of winter light.
• Insulate the water butt and drain your hosepipe before the first freeze splits it.
• Net brassicas against pigeons, and keep an eye out for whitefly.
• Rake up fallen leaves into a wire bin for leafmould — two years and you have the finest soil conditioner on the plot.
• Put out bird feeders and leave a scruffy corner of leaves and logs for hedgehogs. Always check a bonfire pile before you light it.

And take a moment, tea in hand, to watch the light drop behind the hawthorn hedge. That, as much as the pumpkins, is what the allotment is for.