Caring for New Landscaping Shrubs during Cold Weather

If you recently bought some new landscaping shrubs for your Lancaster home, you may be wondering how to care for them as the weather turns colder. Some questions you may have are about how much water and sunlight they need and how you can protect them from Pennsylvania’s harsh winters. We can answer your questions personally when you visit our retail plant center to browse landscaping shrubs. However, we also want to offer some tips here that you can follow at home. Winter can be tough on new landscaping shrubs, but they can easily survive and thrive with proper care and planning on your part.

Although it may not seem like it, the winter sun can do almost as much damage to new landscaping shrubs as the spring and summer sun. You can prevent much of this damage by wrapping the shrubs’ trunks in some type of protective material, like burlap or corrugated paper that is light in color. This will keep the bark from experiencing extremes in temperature.

Another way to protect your landscaping shrubs as the weather gets colder is to make sure they get plenty of water in the late fall. Even when temperatures outside are quite cold, the leaves of the shrubs can get warm in the sun, resulting in transpiration. This can pull water away from landscaping shrubs, leaving them dry.

So how much water do your shrubs really need? This depends on the type of shrub, and if you visit our retail plant center, we can give you more specific information. In general, try to water them regularly in the fall. You can also water them on any warm days we might happen to get during the winter.

A serious threat to new landscaping shrubs is winter burn. To prevent this from happening, you can use evergreen branches to form a wind break over the shrubs. Another way to help protect your landscaping shrubs’ root systems is with mulch. The type and amount of mulch needed depends on the type of shrubs you buy, so we can offer advice on this as well.

With preparation and a few precautions on your part, your new landscaping shrubs will be all set for spring!

For more information on landscaping shrubs near Lancaster, call Root’s Nurseries at 717-898-0041, stop by our plant center in Manheim, or contact us for a Free Landscaping Estimate.