Fall Maintenance Ideas for your Restoration!
Leaves are treating us to brilliant shades of orange, yellow, and rust, shoreland plants are starting to go dormant, frosts are becoming more common; which means the icy days of December are quickly approaching. Before the snow hits there are a few things you can do to put your restoration "to bed" for the season!
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| Spraying Reed Canary Grass in the fall. |
Did any reed canary grass sneak into your restoration this year? Fall is a great time of year to attack reed canary grass with herbicide because it is a "cool season" grass that stays green well into fall. Once native warm season plants have gone dormant, you can spray reed canary grass with a contact herbicide. Dormant plants will not take up herbicide, making it much easier to pull off effective weed control. University of Minnesota research has shown that fall treatments are most effective at controlling this invasive species.
Removing "weed" trees or invasive tree species and their
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Weed trees like this Siberian elm can be removed in the fall.
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saplings is a great fall activity. You can cut and treat the stumps with herbicide or hand-pull the smaller saplings. Green Ash, Boxelder, Mulberry, and Siberian Elm are a few weedy trees that sneak into restorations and can be removed this time of year. Buckthorn is also a great tree to remove even into the winter. That pesky tree keeps its leaves on long after our native trees have dropped theirs, making it easy to identify. You can spray the leaves with selected herbicides this time of year to kill the smaller buckthorn saplings.
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Fall is a great time to do a planting!
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Late into the fall when temperatures have decreased dramatically, we are still conducting plant installations. Most native plants, even if they have gone dormant in the pot, will survive the winter and get an early start in the spring. Have a bare area in your restoration? Put a few plants in this fall and get a jump start on next year! Need plants? Email our Nursery Manager Jill Langer at [email protected] for information on how to order our wholesale nursery stock that is now on clearance!
Now is a great time to collect the seed that has matured on your native plants. Dozens of species are going to seed in the fall and can be collected to spread in bare areas of your restoration. The seed will overwinter on the ground and be ready to germinate in the spring!
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Knocking down plant material and leaving it for pollinator habitat.
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As plants go dormant, their plant
material becomes brown
and dry. While we recommend keeping the vegetation up all winter long for wildlife habitat, some people prefer to remove it in the fall. Make sure you wait for all the plants to go dormant before you cut down the old vegetation and rake it off. Want to help pollinators and other wildlife? Consider just knocking the old vegetation down but leaving it on site to use for valuable nesting habitat
Need help with any of the above fall activities? Give our maintenance crew a call and we will come out and treat your Reed Canary Grass or Buckthorn for you! Email our Maintenance Coordinator Tracy at [email protected] or call at 612-220-4178!
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