A Gardeners Forum Forums General Discussion The Banter Hall Gardener's Chat Winter damage....

Well, DH and I have noticed that I have:

~two cherry trees broke in two.
~a pine tree broken as well
~two crushed and broken cedars
~a completely broken 5 in 1 apple tree(not sure it can be saved)
~another apple tree broken right off at the base
~my plum tree is half broken up


Those will have to be replaced I'm sure.

The others such as spireas, ninebarks, and weigelas can be cut back. As well as my fruit bushes. Alot of trees just need branches recut where they are broken.

I can honestly say that this is the worst damage I have ever seen from the winter. There are about 20 shrubs that need to be cut right back....

I am honestly thinking of not bothering to replace the trees, just dig them up and fill in the holes. I lose hundreds of dollars each year in replacements.

I think I'll concentrate on making bigger flower beds instead...at least they come back every year.

wow that is a lot of damage. I had some from all our snow this winter too. My spireas has lots of broken branches as it is near the house and when the roof had to get shoveled it got hit hard.

So I should cut it back to the ground or let what is left alone?

I know what you mean about wasting money replacing damaged shrubs.

We did have a rough winter. I can hardly believe the snow went so fast. Ours was gone with 1 week of 60 degree weather.

Sorry for all your damage.

Well DH and I started the clean up. We cut most shrubs about 6 inches to the ground, they spring back fast. He cut down the cherry and pine trees and he will dig them out later this week.

We might be able to salvage the plum tree, fingers crossed. there's still too much snow to get at the apple tree and the cedars so we'll deal with them in a week. the snow has been melting like crazy. My side yard is axtually snow-free right now.

Leola, I cut my spireas back to 6 inches.

Yup, I'm not buying any more shrubs again..or trees. I will put my money into perennials from now on.

That's a shame - a lot of trees got ruined this past winter.

We had a few big limbs come down - one of them's still sitting out there waiting for the landlords to send somebody down with a chain saw.

It's not something we can handle - Jeff did move the thing - had to drag it off the fence so it wouldn't fall into the driveway. He and another guy dragged it farther down the lot.

But it needs to be sawed up into firewood (which is what they wanna' do with it - hee hee! It'll smoke like a son-of-a-gun, those old pine branches).

Thanks Tamara, for the info on cutting back my spireas. It was so pretty last year. I won't give up on it though and hope it does spring back fast.

Hope you can salvage the plum tree. I love plums. I don't think one would grow here. I don't have a lot of room for trees. At least that is what DH says. lol

I cut my spireas back a bunch too. They come back.

Sorry Tamara you've had so much damage. Maybe it is time for you to make a change. Then next year you won't have so much clean up to do and you're flowers will be underground until after the worst is over.

Yup, we are not replacing what gets damaged anymore. I just keep wasting money every year for nothing. I can't get ahead. If it's not the snow damage then it's the mice damage.

I think I'll just invest into more flower beds...perennials are so cheap here and they always come back.

So sorry to hear the damage you have had. we don't have severe winter damage here. not as far as trees and bushes anyway, but I've lost a lot of plants in the past due to just a hard freeze. the past few years, i've been putting in more natives and perennials. it's enough work just pulling weeds and keeping mulch in beds. no sense in spending money and planting stuff that won't come back. I did do a few annuals this year, but they came from seed....5 cents a pack.