Although winters are milder here in Louisville as compared to other parts of the country, we still get freezing temperatures, snow, ice, and windy weather, which means our landscapes can still take a beating. These conditions can be tough on plants, which is why it’s important to prepare your landscape for winter.
Your trees and shrubs are an important part of your landscape and you don’t want them to be damaged by harsh winter weather conditions.
In this article, we will share some ways that you can start protecting plants in winter. By making some smart choices for your landscape, you can ensure you are taking steps to keep your property in optimal shape.
These Louisville plant health tips will include:
How to prepare your landscape for winter
#1: Pruning
#2: Preventing frost damage
#3: Protecting plants from cold and windy conditions
#4: Protect fragile roots with mulching
#5: Have trees assessed for risk
#6: Invest in plant health care for healthy plants
What to do during a winter storm
Choosing tree and plant health care services in Louisville
After reading this article, we hope that you will feel prepared to deal with whatever the winter weather may throw at you.
There are a few steps that you can take to make sure you’re protecting plants in the winter.
Pruning plays a valuable role in protecting plants in the winter. Proper pruning goes a long way in preventing storm damage and also ensuring that your trees and shrubs will survive winter conditions.
Ornamental trees, in particular, can be pruned so that any defects or weak branches are removed. This gives your trees a greater chance to withstand pressure from wind, snow, or ice (which can accumulate on branches and make them more likely to break).
Shrubs can also be shaped to be as tight as possible in an effort to prevent snow from falling inside and splaying them open.
You should also aim to prevent frost damage. Frost can harm a plant by causing the water inside of the plant to freeze. This leads to plant cells bursting, which can be deadly to the plant.
Frost damage can occur anytime that the temperatures dip below freezing.
Protecting fragile plants involves covering them in a breathable material, such as burlap or blankets. Avoid using plastic as this material is not breathable and can create a “greenhouse effect” by causing trapped air to overheat inside of the plastic.
Keep in mind that many of your landscape plants will go into a state of dormancy in the winter, which puts them into natural protection mode.
Plants are more susceptible to frost damage in the early winter (before dormancy has set in) or late winter/early spring, as your plants come out of dormancy so keep an eye on temperatures during these “fringe” periods.
Plan to cover your plants anytime that the temperature is predicted to drop below 30 degrees.
Certain plants are more vulnerable to cold-weather conditions than others. Evergreens are particularly subject to potential harm. When the ground freezes and the roots can no longer take up water, they begin to use stored water from their needles.
Mulching also plays an important role in protecting plants from freezing temperatures by insulating the roots. Mulch acts as a protective layer that helps to moderate the soil temperature.
This works the same way in the spring and summer, as temperatures heat up. Mulch acts as an insulator that plays a role in preventing soil temperatures from heating up too much.
As you think about preparing your landscape for winter, you could also consider having your trees assessed for risk. Sometimes there are steps that can be taken to mitigate those risks.
For instance, cabling and bracing is a tree service that can help protect a property from storm damage.
Some trees, due to the way that they grow, already have structural damage that makes them weaker and more likely to fall in a storm. Certain species of trees grow in a way that they become V-shaped, which makes them a liability for cracking and splitting.
During this time, it can also be determined if your tree might require some structural pruning to prevent storm damage. As we’ve mentioned, making sure that you are keeping up with regular pruning can be a valuable way to make your trees more “storm-safe.”
Another way that you can protect plants in the winter is to practice proactive care with plant health services. Put simply, plant health services combine fertilization, pest control, and disease control into a program that will help care for your landscape.
When you help ensure that your plants are in optimal health, you give them a better chance of standing up to harsh winter weather conditions.
The best way to prepare plants for winter is to be proactive and take some of the steps that we mentioned above. When you’re proactive like this, you can prevent a lot of potential problems.
That being said, often homeowners find themselves in the middle of a winter storm, worrying about their landscape. Any storm that brings heavy snow, ice, or wind can be detrimental to the landscape.
Naturally, people worry about limbs or trees themselves falling during storms. Large trees can do a lot of damage.
Ideally, you planned ahead with pruning and your landscape will be in good shape to withstand a storm. But we still want to share some advice on what to do (and not to do) during a storm.
Protecting plants in winter can feel daunting but you don’t have to do it all on your own. You can partner with a professional offering tree and plant health care services in Louisville to ensure you are taking all of the right steps.
Without a doubt, your best course of action is preventative care.
To achieve this, you can partner with a company who will offer you best practice tips but also set you up with realistic expectations. Sometimes that includes making tough decisions like tree removal.
At Limbwalker, when you invest in our tree and plant health care services, you’re getting an expert on your side, helping make valuable recommendations in regard to the ongoing care of your landscape.
This means letting go of worries and knowing that your landscape is in good hands.
You deserve to be able to enjoy your landscape without the worries. When you invest in tree services and plant health care, you can gain valuable peace of mind.
If you’d like to learn more about plant health care for your Louisville home, get in touch, get your quote, and get back to enjoying your yard.