Keep evergreens ever safe and happy Evergreens are cherished in
midwestern gardens, parks, and streetscapes for the steady color
they bring even to the gray and brown winter. Yet as much as we
love to drape them with holiday lights, they often get less
respect and care than color-shifting roses and Japanese maples.
Evergreen trees and shrubs change so little with the passing
days that it's possible to forget they are even alive. But they
are. And growing. And they have needs. To keep evergreens
healthy and happy, it helps to understand a little about them.
Conifers — needled plants, mostly evergreen, that reproduce with
cones — evolved in a particular kind of landscape where
nutrients are scarce — usually high, rocky places, according to
Andrew Bell, the Garden’s curator of woody plants. Where there
are few nutrients, leaves are hard to create and too costly to
abandon each fall. So evergreens keep their leaves through the
winter. But those leaves are in danger of drying out from harsh,
cold winds. So they ev