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How to Maintain Your Wood Fence in the Winter

How to Maintain Your Wood Fence in the Winter

There are few things more damaging for a wooden fence than the effects of a harsh winter. Snow, sleet, rain, and falling branches can do a number on a fence in a variety of different ways.

While there’s nothing that you can do to prevent winter, there are some things that you can do to help protect your fence against the effects of winter. Don’t let your wooden fence meet an early demise. Make sure to do these things so that it can withstand the wear and tear of winter, and live as long as structurally possible.

Use a Protective Wood Stainer

Whether you’re preparing it for winter or not, it’s recommended that you regularly prime your wooden fence with a protective wood stainer. A wood stainer will help your fence to thrive through the ill effects of rain, sleet, snow, and other forms of moisture.

At the very least, you should be applying a protective wood stain to your fence every three years. However, ideally, you will apply a wood stain just before every winter. While it won’t completely protect your fence from the bitter cold and snow, it will help it to survive much longer than it otherwise would.

Cut Branches in its Proximity

When winter rolls around and the cold weather comes raging, trees become prone to freezing. When trees freeze, their branches break off and fall to the surface of the earth. If a wooden fence is struck by one of these falling branches, it can suffer some irreparable damage.

To protect your fence from falling branches, it’s ideal to ensure that no branches are capable of falling in its proximity. In essence, you need to be proactive by cutting any branches that have the potential to break and fall on top of your fence.

Trim Grass Around the Fence

One of the quickest ways to ruin a wooden fence is by letting it become saturated with water. To make your fence lasts as long as possible, you must keep it away from water as much as possible.

When snow falls, it eventually melts. When it melts, it seeps into the ground and is retained by grass. Grass is essentially a container for standing water. So, to keep standing water away from your fence in the winter, it’s wise to cut the grass around the fence as short as possible. Doing so will reduce the amount of water that’s allowed to saturate the fence, providing the fence with a longer lifespan.

Ensure its Stability Before Winter Sets In

When it comes to wooden fences, winter provides no positives. The only things that can happen to your wooden fence during the wintertime are bad things. Something that almost always happens during the winter time is that the ground shifts, causing your fence to shift with it.

Because your fence will almost inevitably shift, it’s important to make sure that it’s nice and stable before winter hits. If it’s already unstable before being subjected to the harsh elements of winter, its instability will be compounded. By ensuring that it’s already stable, you will be able to reduce the ill effects of winter.

Call in a Professional

While there are certainly a number of things you can do yourself to help protect your wooden fence from snow, cold weather, and falling branches, it would still be wise to call in a professional. A professional fencing service can ensure that the fence stands as great of a chance as possible of maintaining itself through a harsh winter.

A professional contractor will take all precautions to ensure that your wooden fence is durable, functional, and stable.

If you’re looking to bring in a professional Chicago area fencing contractor to winter-proof your wooden fence, we here at Action Fence are who you need to call. Our team of professional, knowledgeable, and experienced fencers know exactly what must be done to get your wooden fence through a brutal winter.

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