Spring Cleanup 

Cleaning up your yard and garden in the early spring will improve your yard in the long run.  Start with Roses and shrubs.  When trimming Roses, pull back all of the mulch you put on the rose from the previous fall.  This should be done toward the end of March.  On the scrub roses, take out 1/3 of the old/dead wood down as close to the ground as you can get.  On the teas and smaller roses (knock outs) watch to see what turns out to be “dead” and trim away the dead branches and ends of canes from the bush.  You can begin fertilizing your roses on April 15^th (easy day to remember) to get a jump on having the first blossoms of the season. 

Shrubs are very similar to roses.  Take out about 1/3 of the old wood in the month of March.  Never trim the top of a spring flowering bush until AFTER it has flowered.  You have a 2-week window to do this after the last flower has fallen off the shrub. 

Tree pruning improves a tree's structure and helps keep it healthy. A bit of judicious pruning benefits a tree at many stages of life. Properly pruned young trees will grow into handsome, structurally strong trees.  Young trees require little corrective pruning when older, and will pose less risk of forming weak branches. Mature trees need periodic pruning to remove dead wood, crossed or rubbing branches, and to thin the crown to reduce the “sail” effect. 

The best time to prune is when the tree is dormant -- after the leaves fall off in autumn, and before the buds begin to swell in the spring. The next best time is in the summer, after leaves are fully formed.

Spring flowering trees are best pruned after the flowers have dropped. Try to avoid pruning any tree during leaf formation in the spring, or during leaf drop in the fall. Storm-damaged limbs, dead branches, or branches that may be high risk should be removed as soon as possible.