As the ground begins to thaw, plant life springs back to life, and your landscape enters the growing season. Luckily there’s still some time to get ahead of any necessary projects before the plants wake up. Landscaping companies perform routine maintenance tasks so that landscapes emerge with the greatest potential. Here’s how to minimize surprises by having your landscape contractor add these five landscape maintenance services to your contract in Reading, PA.
Related: How a Landscape Contractor Maximizes the Safety of a Landscape in Reading and Lebanon PA Areas
Snow Removal
Most important right now is the assurance that your softscape won’t be dealt a heavy blow by the forces of winter. Simply moving snow to the side of the walkway or driveway or, even worse, piling it in a section of your lawn, is a certain way to damage your landscape. Natural snowfall is relatively light and, if left alone, doesn’t damage native plant life and many common shrubs and grass transplants as well. It slowly melts and seeps into the ground. However, shoveled or plowed snow packs down and creates a dense, heavy load that suffocates plants. Plus, piles of unsightly snow last well into the warmer temperatures of spring. Setting up a snow removal contract with a landscape contractor will ensure that your paved surfaces are safely clear of snow and your landscape isn’t damaged.
Weeding
Some weeds or unwanted plants do what desirable plants do in the winter: hibernate. They suspend growth and transfer all their energy to preserving the root systems below ground. Much like the healthy plants that you want to encourage to grow in your landscape, this practice primes them for jumping out of the dirt in early spring. By mid-spring, weed control becomes an issue. Instead of worrying about weed removal too late, you should include late-winter pre-emergent weed control in your contract with a landscape company so you can nip weeds in the bud. Throughout the season, your landscape company will apply post-emergent herbicides as needed to control weeds.
Pruning
Trees and shrubs are healthiest when their growth is controlled. Removing damaged or diseased branches from trees and shrubs will help them divert resources to the plant’s healthier areas and often stimulate new growth. This also cleans up any visual obstructions or, more importantly, safety hazards. Dead branches can eventually cause the rest of the tree to slowly die. Dead trees and shrubs dry out and pose a huge fire risk or may dangerously collapse onto structures. To maintain the health of these key focal points in the landscape, it’s important to include pruning in your landscaping contract so that your trees and shrubs grow in the safest and healthiest manner.
Pests and Diseases
Many of the diseases and damage that occur in a landscape begin with poor growing conditions, including drought and poor soil. Your landscape contractor can test and amend soil annually and install a professional irrigation system to keep your landscape well-watered and healthy. As well, yard cleanup each fall and spring is a must. Insects and rodents love to hibernate in piles of rotten leaves or other debris - so as with most things, prevention is better than the cure!
Lawn Care
Lawn care never sleeps. While the mowing season will come to an end in fall, other tasks such as fertilizing, aeration, de-thatching, overseeding, weed management, and installation of sod can happen outside the growing season. Be sure that your lawn contract includes more than mowing to ensure the health of your lawn. While they’re out there, the crews will keep a keen eye out for damaged or struggling areas of the lawn so that they can take care of problems while they are small instead of having to perform major restoration once the lawn is in dire straits.
Related: Landscape Maintenance Essentials for a Lebanon, PA Property
