Preparing for a Real Winter

Weather really is just weather, another part of lives over which we have no control. We have become complacent with our nice weather over the last 10 years.  

Following are examples of what we should be doing from our old check list. They come to you with a word of warning: It’s probably too late this winter for any of these at this point.

1. On tall shrubs, like arborvitae, we used twine to circle the shrub, spiraling up and then down so the heavy snow could not pull the separate branches out and break them. We were then prepared when the snows came, and we knocked it off before the whole shrub collapsed under the weight. We used twine because it would rot and fall to the ground before the next year was over, if we had not removed it before then that is.
2. For the last three mowings of the year, we reduced the cutting height, starting at 3 ½ inches, then 3 inches, then 2 ½ inches. Why? One problem we had the first 30 years of business was snow mold. We regularly mowed this way and still installed fungicides to protect the grass. There is a lot of information on the Web about snow mold. Hopefully, we will not learn the hard way about it again in the spring.
3. We were really anal with our leaf blow outs under the shrubs and trees. Those leaves, covered with snow, create a terrific incubator for bugs and funguses. Snow feels cold to us, but it is an insulator for little critters. They grow in these warm, wet, nutritious conditions almost as well as they do in summer turf.