MOSES LAKE — Rather than starting fresh next spring, there are plenty of plants that can be saved from your garden or lawn for next season. Making sure your plants are stored properly helps ensure they make it through the winter.

Holly Trinnaman started the Gardeners of Moses Lake page on Facebook to share information and tips with other local gardening enthusiasts. She said so much of gardening knowledge is passed on from one grower to another.

After moving to Moses Lake from Arizona about five years ago, she wanted a place where she could share and get tips and experiences from other gardeners in the area.

Trinnaman has already started storing plants for next season, and discussed some tips and practices she’s learned.

Hardy plants that can withstand the freeze are often safe to leave outside for the winter. Trinnaman said her hydrangeas, specifically her big leaf hydrangeas, are plants she keeps protected over winter.

“You can wrap them in burlap, or some people stick chicken wire around them and fill those tubes with leaves to protect them from winds and the hard frosts,” Trinnaman said.

If any plants are left outside, she said, it is a good idea to keep them covered and protected from the harsh winds that frequent the Columbia Basin. Plants that are not hardy enough to last the winter can be “overwintered” in a greenhouse or stored indoors in a cool area.

Potatoes, and other tuber plants, are examples of plants that can be dug up before they freeze and stored inside. The tuber structure stores nutrients that help sustain the plants throughout the winter.

“You’ve got to store them somewhere where it’s not going to freeze, where it’s maybe 45 or 50 degrees,” Trinnaman said. “For most people, that works out to being in a cooler with something packed around them so they won’t dry out.”

Dahlia tubers are an example of the plants she has stored for next year. Boxes, or any old coolers, will work for storage. Trinnaman said she has a friend who receives insulin in coolers and she takes the extras off her friend’s hands when they begin to stack up.

Plants stored in a container should be surrounded with a packing medium, with some moisture added to ensure the plant doesn’t dry out. She said she uses bark for packing her plants, but anything that can hold moisture without getting soggy will work.

“Something that has drainage, you could use wood shavings, or the animal bedding for hamsters,” Trinnaman said. “They need to have a little bit of moisture, so I’ll usually put a cup of water in the cooler before I seal the lid just so they don’t get dried out too much.”

Basements, crawl spaces, pump houses and a garage are places that could work for storing plants during winter. This will be Trinnaman’s first year with a greenhouse to experiment with keeping plants in over winter.

This year, she will keep many of her hydrangeas in the new greenhouse as she experiments with keeping her plants over winter.

“This year, I dug up petunias and I’m going to try and overwinter them and keep them above freezing, and see if they’ll come back,” Trinnaman said. “Boxwood topiaries would fare just a little better if they have a temperate climate, and the boxwood turns a bronze color if they’re exposed to cold temperatures and too much sunlight.”

She said she has her topiary plants in containers that she can move. A number of geraniums she said she and her husband planted outside her husband’s workplace were dug up to be stored in the greenhouse as well. Trinnaman said they can be brought indoors if needed and don’t need to stay in the greenhouse.

Annuals, petunias, herbs and many vegetables are plants that Trinnaman suggests growing from starts from a nursery or seeds in the spring.

“Herbs are typically a short-lived plant,” Trinnaman said. “By the end of the season, when it’s time to dig them up, they’re kind of really woody. Basil gets really woody.”

Trinnaman said her love for gardening started when she was 10 years old and her mother showed her how to propagate a plant. She saw the roots take form and has been hooked ever since.

Casey McCarthy can be reached via email at cmccarthy@columbiabasinherald.com.