A distressed arborvitae bush at my grandmas house after the snow was shaken off Jan 5th Dallas,WI

This is a post reminding everyone with landscape shrubs to shake snow off of bushes as it accumulates, With this brutal winter we’ve had for snowfall it is especially important to remember this task. I’ve seen several homes around the area with significant damage to bushes and shrubs from heavy snow. Most of this damage occurred in December when we had 28 inches of snow which continued to pile up, then when the temperatures rose above freezing at the end of December the weight of the heavy snow melting snow and warm flexible branches crushed bushes like the one above which is now in the shape of a crescent. Evergreens were hardest hit especially ones on Western exposures, to make madders worse right after the melt it turned cold again and froze everything up. Arborvitaes in good winter condition in my gardens January 6th

There are some things that can be done to prevent damage, when ever it snows a heavy load, remember to shake the snow off, a easy way to remember this is when you have to shovel snow anyway. If you did catch yourself forgetting to shake off the snow it is best to leave them until temperatures warm I find it best if the temperatures is at least 25 with sunshine. Branches of evergreens become very brittle in cold temperatures, and often in this situations you will cause more damage then good when trying to get snow off.