Tips for December

TREES & SHRUBS

Check any winter protection you've made for plants and secure if necessary. The Ortho book, Gardening Techniques gives instructions showing the latest and best ways to protect shrubs and trees as well as feed, prune, and how to handle every other major garden task. Start planning spring orders.

ROSES

Check your winter protection to roses and replace or secure where necessary. Preview catalogs for spring plantings.

LAWNS

To avoid creating bare spots in the spring, try not to walk on lawns after the ground freezes. Snowfall provides enough of a cushion to allow foot traffic. Disease Control: If snow mold attacked some areas of your lawn last spring, the disease organisms are probably still present and snow provides the necessary conditions to activate them. Grass infected with snow mold becomes white to pink or gray to black. Control it after the first frost, again during a midwinter thaw, and finally in the spring after the snow melts. Red thread and fusarium patches are problems of cool, humid winters, even where there is no snow. Treat them while the weather is still wet. Multi-Purpose Fungicide (Daconil 2787®) Plant Disease Control or SCOTTS LAWN FUNGUS CONTROL is effective on a wide range of diseases; however, proper identification of specific lawn disease is essential for control. Take a specimen of the disease to a professional garden center or contact your local County Cooperative Extension Agent for positive identification before treatment.

Last Updated: May 21, 2006

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