Holiday Landscaping

This is such an exciting time of the year! With all of the holidays coming up, we love putting up decorations to get into the holiday spirit. This year we thought we'd share some tips for decorating your yard for the holidays:

• Display seasonal flowers. Flowers are the perfect element to dress your yard for any occasion. Coordinate the blooms to seasonal color themes and make sure there is always at least one flower in bloom throughout the year.

• Light up your yard. Get in the holiday spirit by illuminating your trees and shrubs with colorful light strands. Additionally, consider lighting up your walkways with solar lamps. Outdoor lighting can be targeted at specific holiday themes or left more general to provide the perfect ambiance year round.

• Avoid candles. Although they may be pretty to look at, unsupervised outdoor candles are a serious fire hazard and should be avoided at all costs. 

If you have any questions about decorating your yard and and general landscaping questions, reach out to a Bradenton FL landscaping design expert. 

Landscaping Tips

As the weather continues to get colder and we move farther into fall, it's important to keep thinking about landscaping. Thankfully, a Burke VA landscape design service has provided us with some helpful tips to keep in mind this fall and winter. 

Apply mulch. Mulch around your trees and gardens to help conserve moisture and regulate soil temperature. This will promote improved root growth and overall better health. Mulch can also create an edge between your foliage and the grass, which will add an extra visual design element to your landscape.

Don’t forget to water. Your lawn should be watered year round - even in the colder months! If you step on the grass and notice it does not spring back up, turn on the sprinkler!

Know when to prune. Now that most if not all of the leaves have fallen from your tree, you should more easily be able to see branches or spots that need pruning. While minor maintenance to your trees and shrubs is okay year round, remember that the best time of year for major pruning is dependent on each species’ specific grow season.

If you have any questions about your lawn or landscape, don't hesitate to reach out to an expert in landscape maintenance in Charlotte NC.

Point of Views

My house is located right near the water and the sight is simply beautiful; however, some of the trees surrounding my home had started to block my beloved view. I called my local tree pruning in Ann Arbor MI to come out and do some vista pruning. Thanks to them, my view has been restored!

My Lawn Had Dry Patches - Not Pretty!

My front yard was experiencing some dry patches and making the overall appearance of my lawn appear unkempt. Watering the dry patches wasn't helping so I turned to my local lawn maintenance in Hopewell NJ for assistance. They were extremely helpful and made my lawn good as new!

Fence Tips for Dealing with Wind

As Hurricane Matthew makes its way up the Atlantic coast, we decided to focus on the impact high winds can have on fences and the best ways to take precaution. If you live in an area with high winds or in the path of hurricanes, you know how important it is to make sure that your property is secure. That last thing you want to happen is for fence panels to break off and blow around your yard, as they can possibly damage your home or other parts of your yard. Here are a few thing to keep in mind when dealing with high winds:

• If you're thinking about fence installation in Summerfield NC, the less surface area, the better. A chain link or split rail fence can withstand wind much better than a full wooden or vinyl fence. Wood can also generally take higher winds compared to vinyl.
• If you're worried about panels blowing out, use screws to secure them rather than nails or staples. It is also smart to add cross supports to your fence.
• Adding additional posts into the ground can help your force stay standing during high winds.

Is Your Leaning Tree A Danger? A Simple Inspection

Over time, a tree will naturally curve as it grows, creating a "leaning" effect. However, a severely leaning tree can also indicate a dangerous problem that needs to be fixed as soon as possible. How can you tell the difference between a healthy tree curve and one that is a problem?

Check the Lean Angle

A typical tree lean curve should be no more than five or 10 degrees. Anything more indicates a potentially dangerous lean. To check this lean angle, stand at the base of your tree and look straight up. You should be able to gauge whether or not it's passing 10 or even 15 degrees fairly easily.

Watch for Gaps in The Soil

Are there small gaps forming in the soil on one side of your tree? If so, there's a chance that the root system of your trees might be coming loose, causing excessive leaning. Watch these gaps over a several week period. If they stay relatively unchanged, there might not be a problem. However, if they grow larger, a bigger issue may be at stake.

Look for Sudden Above-Soil Roots

Above-soil roots aren't uncommon as a tree grows, but if your tree is fairly old and you suddenly see roots, you might have a problem. This is especially true if the roots seem to rise above the ground a little more every day. Your tree is probably pretty close to tipping over at that point.

If you spot any of these dangerous symptoms in your tree, please contact a local Springfield VA tree service professional today to get this dangerous tree removed from your yard.

Property Owners Should Take Mushrooms Seriously

Have you noticed mushrooms growing on your property’s trees? If so, better call a tree care professional. Depending on the type of mushroom, it could spell trouble for your beloved tree. Certified arborists know which tree mushrooms are nothing to worry about and which ones are causes for great concern. If it is a worrisome mushroom, total tree removal may be the safest option available.

So which mushrooms should prompt calls to a tree care company? A few at the top of the list are white, brown and soft rot bark mushrooms. They are all capable of killing trees in their own way. For example, brown rot generally causes damaged tree limbs to crumble apart in certified arborists’ hands, whereas holding white rot affected branches is a lot like hanging on to a kitchen sponge.

Soft rot, on the other hand, isn’t always immediately visible to the untrained eye because it generally creates minor exterior discoloration. However, it has the potential to pave the way for internal fissures and hollows to form over time. Those fissures and hollows, in turn, could develop white or brown rot, along with other life-threatening problems. As such, tree companies led by certified arborists take soft rot just as serious as they do the brown and white varieties.

The feel of the wood is not the only thing a tree company’s certified arborists take into consideration when analyzing mushroom growth. They also take note of where the mushrooms are located, the extent of the fungi infestation and why the colony likely established in or on the tree in the first place. Oftentimes, the fungi take hold after summer storm damage or accidental injuries caused by routine lawn care.

To have the mushrooms growing in, on or around your properties’ trees examined by a certified arborist, contact your local Birmingham AL tree care professional today.

Why Hiring a Professional Is the Way to Go with Tree Removal

In an emergency, hiring a Winchester MA tree removal professional is the most reliable option to remove a tree from your property. But, when you have time to think about tree removal, you might think about doing it on your own.

While the main benefit that will likely come to mind is saving money, taking the time to analyze the pros and cons will help you understand that professional tree removal service is the ideal option.

Eliminate Safety Concerns

When a professional does the job, you do not have to worry about your family, neighbors, or anyone else getting injured as you will have a skilled and experienced team on the job.

Avoid Property Damage

Another important factor, along with ensuring safety, is avoiding property damage. A tree that is incorrectly felled can easily destroy parts of a home, fencing, gardens, and more.

Carry Insurance

In the rare case that something does go wrong and property is damaged, a tree company will have the insurance they need to repair or replace the damaged parts until it is back to normal.

Quick Service

Since professionals work with trees on a daily basis, they know how to do their job quickly. If you want to stick around while the removal occurs, you will likely only have to stay for a few hours.

Follow-Up Cleaning

Once a tree has been felled, the next major step is removing the tree. For mature trees, this can be quite a large task, but you will have professionals that can clean up the tree and all branches efficiently.

If you need to get a tree removed on your property, you should definitely look into professional help.

Tree Care Helps Keep Wild Mushrooms Where They Belong, On Plates

Mushrooms may look great on a plate but no one is happy to see them pop up in beautifully landscaped lawns. In South Florida, their presence generally signals a growing fungal problem that could decimate a property over time. Thus, it’s imperative that at the first signs of fungal invaders, homeowners contact a tree care specialist.

Although there are many problematic fungi living along the Gulf Coast, there is one of particular concern to certified arborists. It’s armillaria. There are a number of things that make it a certified arborist’s concern, not the least of which is its inherent ability to spread underground as well as above it. This duality virtually ensures that the fungus will continue to thrive in Florida without tree care experts’ intervention.

The good news is healthy trees rarely fall prey to armillaria. It’s the ones that are weakened by drought, poor care, open wounds and pests that are most at risk of becoming a fungal host. Their immune systems are frequently taxed to the point of being unable to aggressively fend off subsequent offenders. As such, the spores are able to work their way into the tree’s sensitive, root system and begin their dirty work. Afterward, arborists will have no choice but to recommend that property owners take uncompromising action.

Hard-nosed action generally involved removing all infected trees in their entirety and treating the soil. At first blush, treating the soil once the trees are removed may seem like overkill. It’s not because remember, this particular time of fungus is capable of living and spreading underground. So the surrounding earth’s health has to be addressed too. Otherwise, property owners run an overwhelming risk of losing additional trees to the fungal spores in the future. To learn more about tree care measures used to address potential armillaria outbreaks, please contact your local Gulfport MS tree service provider.