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January and February Gardening Tasks

Posted February 1, 2021

Yes, it’s cold and often grey outside, but that doesn’t mean your garden chores are done for the season! Believe it or not, your garden is still a living and growing thing all through winter. Now that the days are growing longer you’ll have more time to get all of your indoor and outdoor gardening chores done.

January and February are the months to consider doing a winter prune on your deciduous shrubs and fruit trees, before the buds pop. Trim out anything dead, diseased, or damaged. This will be easier to see now before there are any leaves on the branches. Trees and shrubs left unpruned may have fewer blooms and less growth come spring. Prune roses as well and they’ll reward you with a riot of blooms.

It’s also a good time for planting early spring bulbs! Yes, it’s true, if you can work the soil it’s not too late to plant spring-flowering plants such as Crocus, Hyacinths, Tulips, Daffodils and more. For summer bulbs you’ll want to take a look at them and make sure none of them are rotted or collapsed. This indicates either disease or a bug infestation, so you’ll want to get rid of those before it spreads to your healthy bulbs.

Examine your perennial plants for frost heaves. This happens when the roots get exposed due to the freezing and thawing cycles of the ground. If you find them make sure the roots are properly buried and consider adding some mulch over the area to prevent future heaves.

January and February are a good time to plant bare-root hedges, which are cheaper than pot-grown. These should become available toward the end of February, so think about digging your holes now when the ground is softer and easier to work with.

Sweet Pea is one of the great early crops to start from seed packets at this time. Early January is the best time to do that. Make sure they are in a frost-free area, and they’ll be ready for planting in March or April!

Turn the soil in your vegetable garden. The weather over the next few months will help to break it down and get it ready for planting in spring once the cold weather passes.

How a Warm Winter Affects Plants

Posted January 4, 2021

For the past few years, Long Island has had relatively mild winter weather. While some people enjoy warmer weather in the middle of winter, for plants the fickleness of mother nature can be extremely confusing.

During the cool season of fall, plants begin to enter dormancy. They are, for all intents and purposes, asleep. They do not put out new growth or take in many nutrients. However, when winter temperatures warm up for a long period of time (weeks instead of days) plants may break dormancy.

When trees and shrubs break dormancy they may push out flower buds or new shoots for branches. This can be a problem when a cold snap comes and cold weather returns as those buds and branches will likely die off in the cold weather. Fruit trees in particular may have their spring fruiting ability affected by extremely cold weather after warm temperatures.

Spring flowering plants may begin to push out of the ground early, breaking ground in early winter instead of spring with similar results as with trees and shrubs.

Another issue that comes from a warmer winter is that harmful insects will not be killed off. Normally, during cold winters harmful insects and their eggs are killed off in great numbers with just a few surviving through until spring. These insects hide in tree bark, the grass of your lawn, leaf piles, the shingles on your house, and more. With a mild winter, there are more resources available for pests to consume, which means that there will be a lot more pests around. Bugs like cockroaches, mosquitoes, spiders, ticks, mites, moths, bees, and wasps can all benefit from a warmer winter. Bugs that burrow into trees may also be more active in a mild winter giving them more opportunity to cause damage.

There is no good way to protect your plants from a fickle winter, but there is no need to worry as most of them will do just fine once spring comes around and the weather warms up normally. The best thing you can do is avoid heavy pruning in late summer and during the fall, as this triggers new growth that will likely be killed in the cold weather. Generally speaking, even if the cold kills off new growth and flowers the issue is only cosmetic and will resolve itself over the next growing season.

Winter Gardening Tasks: Keeping Busy During the Cold Months

Posted January 20, 2020

During this time of year, it may seem as though spring and summer will never arrive. While it’s definitely not the growing season there are still plenty of garden chores to keep you busy through these winter months.

Though you’ve probably already completed your fall cleanup, it’s important to keep any new leaves from staying on the grass for too long. These leaves can smother the grass and make your lawn care work come spring a lot more difficult. Rake them up and use them as mulch for perennials and bulb planting beds, or put them in with your compost for next year’s garden beds. Your vegetables will thank you.

During the winter most plants and trees are dormant, meaning they’re not actively growing, so it can be a great time to trim your trees and shrubs. This is known as dormant pruning and is actually healthier for your trees and shrubs than pruning during their actively growing stage. You’ll be at less risk for spreading diseases and fewer bugs will be around to attack the wound on the plant.

Keep your eye on evergreen shrubs and if they need it, tie and support them to keep them from breaking in the snow. If you find them bending too much during the early snow that’s a sign that the tree can use a little more support.

Using burlap can help you by providing a windbreak for sensitive hedges, but it can also protect shrubs from deer who get more and more likely to feed in residential areas as the winter wears on.

Finally, if you feed the birds during the summer it’s very important that you keep your feeders full during the winter. Birds become dependent on human-provided food sources over time and having them suddenly disappear can be hard on them during the cold winter months.

Taking care of these winter yard work chores a little bit at a time on the weekends can help make the winter hours pass until you can get back to your more traditional gardening tasks once more.

Trees and Snow: The Do’s and Don’ts of Winter Tree Care

Posted December 9, 2019

We’ve already had a tiny bit of snow here on the Island. The light kind of snow that melts as soon as it hits the ground and is prettier to look at than worrisome. However, with winter just around the corner—and an abundance of storms predicted—it pays to go over what to do about your trees and shrubs after a heavy snowfall.

Heavy wet snow can cause damage to delicate young trees and shrubs. The weight of snow can break branches or split them, and some may even be uprooted if the snow is heavy enough.

During most snow and ice storms, you won’t have to do anything to your trees and shrubs. Nature is pretty good at taking care of itself, but once in a while, it can use a helping hand. While a light covering of snow won’t do any damage, if you see branches—or in the case of some shrubs like arborvitae, the whole plant—being pulled to the ground by the weight of the snow you may want to get some of the snow off before the branches or trunk snap under the weight. If a plant tips you’ll have to wait until spring to right it, and once you do you should stake it with supports for at least a year or two so that it can regrow a strong root base.

It is best to remove the snow before it freezes over as removing the snow which has frozen to the plant can cause more damage than you’ll save by getting it off. Branches can be more delicate than they look and when already weakened by the weight of ice and snow they can snap off easily.

If branches have already broken, there isn’t much you can do to save them. It’s best to just leave them until spring to prune. However, if the branch is a safety hazard you should trim it right away or call a professional like Organically Green Horticultural Services to come and take a look at the damage, assess it, and find the best solution for the health of the plant.

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January and February Gardening Tasks

How a Warm Winter Affects Plants

Winter Gardening Tasks: Keeping Busy During the Cold Months

Trees and Snow: The Do’s and Don’ts of Winter Tree Care

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