HERE WE ARE, going into the second week of December with the next 10-day forecast calling for above-freezing weather. We have avoided the somewhat common event of snowfall in November as the jet stream once again passed directly over us. Woohoo!
Without a doubt, snow and possibly lots of it will eventually be on its way to your yard and on top of your plants.
The thought of frost and large sheets of ice have me realizing that snow here on the Peninsula can close down the Morse Creek dip and make driving hazardous.
Soon, just like my hometown of Green Bay, gardeners here must contend with the damages caused by snow and ice breakage on our cherished plants.
First and foremost, one must cut away damaged, broken, twisted branches and limbs, but take caution. When snow first begins to fall, the prudent gardener can go outside and gently push or prod the branches, thus knocking off the damaging live weight of snow (in engineering, it is called snow loads).
Never do this when ice is involved. Whacking ice off branches destroys far more of the tree than if you just let it melt naturally.
Cold equals brittle. Very cold conditions when coupled with snow could also be hazardous to your snow-covered trees. Think of the collapsed buildings in the 1996 snow-then-rain event here in Port Angeles that destroyed the truck route west of town and the old DSHS building over by Angeles Furniture on First Street.
When temperatures dive into the 20-degree range, the limbs become brittle. Removing the snow can cause numerous lateral growths of one year or less to snap off.
The first rule is to remove snow very carefully. Every few inches of accumulation as it falls, as soon as it falls.
But what should one do when the shrubs and bushes lay crippled, cracked and broken? As always, at any time of the year, one should repair and remove storm damage soon after it is noticed. Twisted, cracked branches can manifest into a variety of problems as insects and disease move into the sugared, nutrient-rich, sap-extruding wound.
The gnarled branch can also strip more bark away as it falls, ripping through more of the tree. Then the wind can whip the branches around, breaking off buds and stems of neighboring plant parts, too.
So proceed by reaching for your equipment — ladders, saws and pruners. In the snow and ice, remember safety first.
Start by cutting away pieces of the broken limb and removing them, keeping in mind that a large piece of snow-laden bush can break many branches as it crashes to the ground.
Next, you prune or cut the stem, branch or limb at the break and remove it carefully from the tree.
Then, the precision cuts remain. You do not want to leave a jagged horn, nor do you want a weird-growing stub. A horn cut inches above a node (an area on the plant where new growth forms) will not sprout anew and will actually die back slowly into the heartwood of the plant, much worse than the original damage.
In many plants, however, a stub of a foot or two that is cut at a node will grow numerous new branches that will grow up through the plant.
This is not the desirable growth and means a thinning cut is next required. A thinning cut removes a branch or stem at the point it radiates from another branch, stem or main trunk.
Be careful. If you do not make a deep undercut first, you will further damage the plant by tearing away a long slender strip of bark along the bottom side of the branch down the trunk or primary limb when the cut branches tear away, falling to the ground.
An undercut is made at the base of the branch to be cut away, and it’s a deep upward cut with a saw curving around the whole bottom third of the branch. After the undercut, you align the saw up on the top side and cut through the branch, meeting up with the lower previous cut.
Perennials and ornamental plants are basically OK, as the snow insulates them from the cold.
From bridge designs to gardening designs, we all must change our equations in life after Mother Nature has her way, forcing us to take a second look in our ever-changing Peninsula landscape during winter.
Have a great winter and stay well all!
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Andrew May is a freelance writer and ornamental horticulturist who dreams of having Clallam and Jefferson counties nationally recognized as “Flower Peninsula USA.” Send him questions c/o Peninsula Daily News, P.O. Box 1330, Port Angeles, WA 98362, or email news@peninsuladailynews.com (subject line: Andrew May).
