Your December Landscape and Gardening To-Do List

If you haven’t started on your landscape and gardening tasks yet, now is the perfect time. Your trees may be shedding their leaves and the foliage looking drab and dull, but they’ll need care and maintenance to set them growing healthily and beautifully come spring. To get you started on these tasks, Backyard Reflections, the trusted landscape design company in the area, shares this handy checklist. 

Plants and Garden

Your greenery will be vulnerable to cold damage, so their protection should be a primary focus.

• Inspect the trunk of large shrubs for damage. Any major injuries may require wrapping their trunk over the winter.

• Cover your plants and bulbs with blankets, drop cloths, or frost cloths, to reduce the potential of dieback and bulb death.

• Before the ground freezes, apply additional mulch to bulbs, perennials, or other small plants and trees. This is also a good time to plant bulbs that grow in spring–but make sure they haven’t dried out or rotted over the summer.

• Potted plants that are normally placed outdoors should be relocated to a sheltered area, either inside your home or in the garage. This way, they’ll remain safe against the harsh winter chill. Just make sure they’ll still get enough sunlight while indoors.

• Mulch over any remaining vegetables in the garden if you want to carry them over the winter.

Trees

Given how your trees play such an important role in enhancing the look and feel of your landscape and garden, you have to take measures to protect them this cold season.

• Prevent sunscald by wrapping the trunks of younger trees with tree wrap strips or similar materials.

• Prune and trim your trees as necessary. If you have no idea how and which ones to prune, you can always call a trusted landscape maintenance expert like Backyard Reflections for the job.

• Consider spraying fruit trees with winter treatments to protect them.

• Get rid of any dead branches to keep your trees healthy.

Call Us Today!

You probably know Backyard Reflections best as a trusted expert in landscape design and outdoor living services. But you can also count on us to handle all your landscape and garden maintenance needs this season. Call us today at (320) 274-6336 (Annandale) or (218) 454-1065 (Pequot Lakes). You may also fill out this contact form to schedule your no-obligation consultation. We proudly serve the West Metro, Pequot Lakes, Annandale, and Brainerd Lakes, MN areas.