It’s a rite of fall — green leaves turn red and gold and then fall as trees prepare themselves for winter. It’s an excellent time to give your trees a good once over.
Are there dead branches or limbs, or large areas of fungus? Is the tree leaning? Are the roots well-grounded? A local arborist can determine whether there are problems that require immediate action.
Dead branches — or the entire tree — can come down in a storm. Be proactive, arborists say. “It’s a lot cheaper to have the limb cut off than to fix your roof,” said Jonathan Hammond, owner of Alpine Tree and Shrub Care in Denver.
And it’s not just the dead limbs.
“Pruning your tree can make it better able to withstand the extra weight of ice and snow,” the Tree Care Industry Association says on its website Treecaretips.com. ” Branches can be thinned to reduce their surface area and wind resistance.”
The U.S. Forest Service has a guide for pruning trees, including dos and don’ts and when trees should be pruned.
But heights and chain saws can be a dangerous combination for amateurs. Sharon Lilly, director of education for the International Society of Arboriculture, said people should call a certified arborist for pruning large trees. “Homeowners can do the smaller and lower stuff themselves,” she said.
Getting plenty of water
There are other things that can be done to help trees withstand harsh winters.
Give them a “good, long, slow drink,” Lilly said. All trees should get that fall watering, but especially young ones planted in the last three years, and evergreens. “You might even do that more than once going into the winter months,” she said.
Watering should be done before the ground freezes so the water can reach the roots.
A layer of organic mulch around the tree can help maintain moisture. The mulch also insulates and protects the upper roots, said Tchukki Andersen, staff arborist at the Tree Care Industry Association. And, it will help replenish nutrients in the soil. Think of it as an “early spring snack” for the trees when the area warms up, she said.
Arborists caution against placing mulch right up against the tree trunk. Think of shaping it like a saucer instead of a cone, said Vermont master gardener Ann Sherman: The mulched area should be as wide as possible to cover the underground roots but no deeper than 2 to 4 inches. “The bigger the mulch area, the better the benefit,” Lilly said.
For branches that have a weak union, or crotch, cabling is sometimes recommended. Lilly said that should be done by a professional, because there are “a lot of ways to do more harm than good.”
Keeping snow in mind
In areas where it snows a lot, small, fragile trees can be protected with a support tepee, essentially a tripod of plywood to prevent the snow from accumulating, she said.
Also, some smaller trees can be winterized by temporarily tying some of the branches together .
“It’s almost an engineering exercise, looking at your trees and what the potential loads are going to be and how the tree is going to respond,” she said.
Hammond said that load can be heaviest during early season snowstorms, when trees still have their leaves. The leaves act like a net to catch the snow.
“If we get an early October snow, it can be really devastating to the trees,” he said.
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