How to Care for Plants and Shrubs in Winter: 8 Tips for Commercial Properties

Winter is a restful break for those plants and shrubs that make your commercial property look great all spring, summer and fall, impressing everybody with their bright flowers and vibrant leaves. 

But that doesn’t mean you should forget about them. Plants need some winter care to make sure they emerge green and healthy in the spring. 

Soggy leaves left on your lawn can smother your turf. Shrubs can break under the weight of misplaced snow piles. Unprotected plants become feasts for bugs once the spring thaw arrives.

How to protect plants in winter? Don’t bury shrubs under piles of snow. Use dormant oil to deter hungry spring bugs. Protect plants and turf from ice melt products. Cover shivering plants with a cozy blanket of mulch. Use snow stakes to help prevent snow plow damage. 

Bradley Sarno, enhancement operations manager at Level Green Landscaping, walks us through a few key tasks.

Let’s learn more about caring for plants in winter, including:

Target Bugs with Dormant Oil

Use Mulch to Protect Plants

Dormant Pruning Keeps Trees and Shrubs Healthy 

Protect Plants  From Damaging Salt

Don’t Bury Shrubs in Snow

Snow Stakes Help Protect Turf from Snow Plow Damage 

Don’t Cut Perennials Back Too Soon

Remove Leaves and Debris from Turf

1. How to Protect Plants in Winter? Target Bugs with Dormant Oil

Dormant oil, also called horticultural oil, is a petroleum-based pesticide used to control pests on trees and shrubs during the winter dormant season.

It’s great for azaleas and roses plagued by mites, aphids or lace bugs. 

“Instead of poisoning the bugs, you’re basically smothering them with the oil,” Sarno says.

The oil kills any insects as well as their eggs, so they won’t hatch in the spring.

2. Mulch is Great for Protecting Plants in Winter

Everybody loves that rich brown layer of fresh mulch in the spring, but fall mulch is just as important. 

Mulch acts as a cozy blanket for plants. A few inches spread around the base of your shrubs and trees adds a layer of toasty insulation.

Mulch helps the soil stay frozen, to prevent heaving during freeze and thaw cycles. It insulates roots from the cold. And it holds in vital moisture. It’s a key part of winter care for plants and shrubs. 

3. Winter Care for Plants and Shrubs Includes Dormant Pruning

Part of caring for plants in winter is looking ahead to their health in future seasons. Winter is a great time to prune your trees and shrubs.

“The plants have stopped growing and the leaves have fallen off, so you can really get a good look at the structure of the plant,” Sarno says. “The foliage isn’t hiding dead branches or limbs that are crossing or growing in the wrong direction.”

But don’t go crazy. Not all plants benefit from this winter pruning, he says.

“Don’t whack away now at any plant that will flower in the spring, or you’ll cut off all its buds,” he says.

But summer blooming plants like spirea, hydrangea, crape myrtle and shrubs like euonymus love a great dormant pruning, Sarno says.

“You don’t have to do it every year, but every two or three seasons is really beneficial,” he says.

There’s another benefit to dormant pruning, too. When you prune in the warm spring and summer months, those fresh cuts attract insects, which can spread disease.

The fresh pruning cuts we make now, during dormancy, will heal faster. That means less time for them to attract insects and disease.

4. Protecting Plants in Winter From Damaging Salt

Excess salt and ice melt products can damage lawns and landscape plants. 
Level Green crews use an engineered ice melt mixture that’s less corrosive than straight rock salt and friendlier to landscaping and the environment.

But we also work hard to keep it on hard surfaces so the chemicals don’t damage your turf and plants.

Crews use the required amounts of these materials, and no more. We measure all sidewalks and lanes and calculate the exact amount needed.

Level Green crews use spreaders with guards that keep the product only on pavement, not turf or plants, Sarno says.

“We put it only where it needs to be.”

Too much of these products will burn the lawn, leaving unsightly brown patches of dead grass. 

Beyond killing grass and plants, excess salt and ice melt products runoff into rivers and streams and end up in the Chesapeake Bay. Careful use of snow melt products is crucial to protect plants in winter and protect the environment.

5. Winter Care for Plants and Shrubs: Don’t Bury Them in Snow

Plan ahead with your snow removal contractor to pile snow away from shrubs and plants that could break from the weight of the snow.

It should be part of that all-important pre-season walk through with your snow removal company. 
Level Green account managers walk your property with you, before the snow flies, taking careful notes. 

We're gathering important information to help us prepare detailed overhead site maps of your property. Our snow and ice management crews use these maps as they work to quickly and efficiently clear your property for winter safety on your commercial property, including where to pile the snow — and where not to
pile it — to protect plants in winter. 

6. Snow Stakes Help Protect Turf from Snow Plow Damage

Level Green crews install snow stakes at customers’ properties at the beginning of the winter season and remove them in the spring.

Snow stakes are markers inserted into the ground to indicate the edge of a driveway, pathway, or curb. They help plow drivers know where pavement ends and lawn begins.

Without them, snow plow blades can dig in along the edges of the lawn, causing it to lift, rip, and tear. 

7.  Caring for Plants in Winter Means Not Cutting Them Back Too Soon

All those hostas, daylilies and heuchera that beautified your property all summer are looking pretty ratty by fall. 

But don’t be too quick to cut them back for winter, Sarno says. Even in late fall, “they’re still gathering nutrients they need for next spring,” he says. “We might trim them a bit to tidy them up, but wait until 
they’re completely done to cut them back.”

8. How to Protect Your Lawn in the Winter? Get Rid of That Debris

Your lawn needs air to breathe. Leave a soggy mess of decaying leaves on your lawn all winter and your grass will suffocate. That smothering layer of leaves also invites pests and diseases.

Level Green Landscaping crews mulch leaves whenever possible, using a mulching mower that breaks the leaves down into nutritious bits beneficial to your turf.

But if you have a property with lots of trees, you may have too many leaves to mulch. In that case, crews remove them with a leaf vacuum, which shreds them and loads them onto a truck.

The leaves are trucked to a composting facility to turn into compost to enrich planting beds.

Need Expert Winter Care for Plants and Shrubs? Trust Level Green

Don’t let winter damage your prized plants — protecting plants in winter is crucial to your landscaping’s health.

Leave it to us. 

If you’re not already a Level Green Landscaping client, we’d love to add you to our growing list of happy customers. 

Our focus is on commercial properties like offices, mixed-use sites, HOAs, municipalities and institutions in Maryland, Washington DC and parts of Virginia.

Contact us at 202-544-0968. You can also request a free consultation online to meet with us one-on-one.

We’d love to hear from you.