Falling branches

Should you knock snow off of tree branches?

You see, sometime the leaves don’t fall off the trees soon enough. An early, heavy, wet, snow comes and all those leaves in the trees collect the snow adding tremendous weight to the branches. Every winter trees lose branches during the first heavy snowfall. A wise gardener, aware of the leaves in the trees and continuing storm will take a rake and knock the snow out of the tree before it builds up too much. This keeps the branches from breaking off and preserves a natural shape to the tree.

Here is the catch. branches that would break off are allowed to grow. They may look good but perhaps they are going at an angle and in a direction that makes them susceptible to collecting snow. With your care the branches grow larger and larger until one winter you are away visiting in-laws when the snow storm hits. The branch fills with snow and breaks off, only now the branch has grown so large that it splits the tree in half when it falls. What once would have only meant a few broken branches has become a fatal flaw.

So, on the one had you leave your trees to the wiles of the weather. They lose branches now and then and lack the symmetry and grace you may desire. But they grow strong and with the character that is the fruit of surviving. Or you can carefully tend your trees, make them appear as you wish. Their life will then be tied to your own, their survival dependent on your rake.