How to Bag Those Bagworms
A butterfly emerging from a cocoon is a magical sight. Witnessing it spread its wings, the beautiful colors stretching out in the sun for the first time, it’s mesmerizing. But, somehow that sense of awe doesn’t translate when a black, fuzzy moth emerges from its bag....
Get Your Lawn Summer Ready
Admit it—you have lawn envy. The green lawns of summer are beckoning to you and all you want is to carpe diem the blades of grass. Well, if a perfect summer lawn is your goal then this is the blog for you. A healthy summer lawn starts with pre-summer maintenance. Your...
Lawn Rust: What it Is and How to Fix It
Does your lawn look like a 1960’s astronaut had an accident with their powdered Tang packet? That is to say it looks as if it is coated with an orange or yellowish colored dust. Well it is probable that it is not an orange flavored drink mix, (nobody drinks that...
The Magic of Lawn Fertilization (When, Why, and How)
Shhh don’t tell anyone but getting a green lawn has nothing to do with magic. It is all about fertilization. Fertilization plays an important role in helping your lawn look good all year long, but knowing when, why and how can be tricky, so check out these tips!...
Everything You Need to Know about Lawn Aeration
You are probably familiar with the basics of a beautiful lawn: mowing, fertilizing and watering. But sometimes those basics can leave your lawn, well a little basic. To get the lush lawn of your homeowner dreams it is also important to ensure that nutrients can reach...
Answers to Your Top Tree Pruning Questions
The number one way to keep a tree healthy is by pruning. Pruning is the selective removal of parts of a tree in order to shape the tree, improve tree health, and reduce the risk of falling branches. Why is pruning important? Pruning provides both cosmetic and...
All About Aphids
Aphids are soft-bodied insects that use their piercing sucking mouth-parts to feed on plant sap. As they feed, aphids secrete large amounts of a sticky fluid known as honeydew. This sweet syrup-like substance drips onto plants, attracting ants and promoting a black...
The Essentials of Weed Control
Weeds are the number one problem when it comes to keeping your lawn attractive. Unfortunately, there’s not one miracle cure for this common problem. Since every weed is different, different forms of treatment must be applied and underlying causes may need to be...
Your Trees VS. Power Lines
Our modern landscape, whether suburban, rural, or urban, is criss-crossed with power lines. They provide essential utilities for our homes and businesses and largely go unnoticed... until they’re touching the trees in our yards and creating a less than safe...
Preparing Your Trees for the Next Big Storm
In south-central PA, storms are inevitable, often unexpected, and unfortunately destructive. Whether it be a hurricane, thunderstorm, tornado, or snow and ice event, there is a significant risk of damage to the trees on your property if you’re not adequately prepared....
The Lowdown on Root Care
Roots have become a popular comparison for our heritage, our family structure, or where we’ve come from. We use metaphors to describe returning to a previous station in life by saying we are going back to our roots, or when we’ve planted ourselves somewhere new which...
Tree Preservation Tips During Construction
Building or renovating a home opens the door to exciting opportunities- the kitchen you’ve always dreamed of, the perfect master bathroom, an inviting front porch. Whether you’re breaking ground on new construction or adding on to your existing home, don’t forget to...
Soil Management: The Basics
When assessing the health of lawns and trees, our team gets pretty deep. That’s because we know that beautiful trees and lawns can only grow from healthy roots. We start with the basics- soil. When natural soil processes aren’t providing the nutrients and essential...
Everything You Need to Know About Soil Compaction
In healthy trees, roots radiate outward from the base, spreading horizontally through the top several inches of ground to achieve the best mix of essential nutrients, water, and oxygen. If unimpeded by soil limitations or other physical...
The Ins and Outs of a Proper Tree Evaluation
When it comes to the health of your trees and the safety of your property, proper evaluation is key. Too often, issues that could be easily resolved with proper maintenance and care result in tree death or property destruction when ignored. A tree evaluation from the...
Emerald Ash Borer: The Warning Signs
Good’s Tree and Lawn Care is on the frontline of protecting your trees from invasive species. One of the most dangerous pests found in local trees is the Emerald Ash Borer. The Emerald Ash Borer is an emerald green beetle that originates from Eastern Asia. It’s known...
A Guide to Deer Barriers and Repellents
South central Pennsylvania has a whitetail deer overpopulation problem. There is a decrease in the number of hunters going into to the woods each fall and continued development pressure is decreasing the area of natural areas for deer to subsist. Due to these...
Caring for your Tree, the Organic Way
Many gardeners have felt the tension between protecting the environment and maintaining a green, weed-free yard. With limited time to devote to our green space, containers of unpronounceable, often toxic chemicals offering quick fixes may seem like the easy way...
Snow, Ice and your Lawn
Snow fall is inevitable and you will have to remove it from the paved surfaces. To prevent damaging your lawn, simply stay within the lines. Avoid damaging the lawn at the edges of theses paved surfaces by simply staying off of them. Shovels, snow blowers and snow...
High Wind Advisories
As evidenced by the barrage of winter weather, including thunder snow, it’s no secret that Central PA has some volatile weather conditions. Sometimes, we have fair warning of these intense weather events, but often, they crop up out of nowhere and can do serious...
Brace Yourself: The Truth About Tree Stability
There are many features that go into the livelihood of tree species in our landscaping. They must have adequate soil, a supply of oxygen and nutrients, consistent pruning, and water to grow effectively. There is no guarantee when it comes to a tree’s survival rate,...
No, Deer
In any successful marriage, the phrase “yes, Dear” will become prominent. However, when it comes to the marriage between the health of your landscaping and the common whitetail deer, we must resoundingly say “no, deer.” While the vision of a herd in your backyard can...
A Bite about Beneficial Bugs
In the summer on the East Coast, it’s no secret that there are a plethora of bugs flying about and landing on nearly everything. Many bugs that frequent our plant life aren’t the best possible visitors for the plants’ livelihood, but standard pesticides aren’t...
Guardians of the Garden: The Benefits of Beneficial Insects
Day and night, your yard is abuzz with activity, much of it a life-and-death struggle between predators and prey. Though they are seldom noticed, tiny heroes of the agricultural world aka “beneficial insects” (the bugs that eat other bugs) — patrol their surroundings...
Protect Your Lawn from Lawn Mites with These Easy Tips
Sometimes big problems come in teeny tiny sizes. Mites are small garden pests that can be easily overlooked, that is until you see their effect. You'll see their damage to your lawn immediately-- mites can wreak havoc on your labored-over stretch of greenery. Three...
Spring Lawn Care Myths You Probably Believe
Now that winter has wound down and spring is finally here, it’s time to think about landscaping. When it comes to lawn care, there’s no shortage of wrong information. We have heard (and seen) it all when it comes to lawns and we feel it is our duty to impart some of...
Your Top Spring Landscaping Questions Answered
The weather is warming up and soon our landscapes will be in full bloom. Good’s has compiled the most frequently asked spring landscaping questions to help keep your landscape looking great this spring. Do I need to water my lawn in the early spring? The short answer...
Pennsylvania’s Most Wanted: The Springtime Pests at the Top of Our List
They’re coming. Pests threatening your landscape this spring could very well affect the health and beauty of your trees and shrubs. Spring is the typical time when insects begin to emerge from inactivity and fungi begin to spread with the increased moisture and warmer...
A Roundup of Three Tree Diseases
As one of our fair presidents, Franklin D. Roosevelt, once said, “Forests are the lungs of our land, purifying the air and giving fresh strength to our people.” We are blessed to have a climate that sustains the growth of a variety of beautiful trees. However, our weather also lends itself to an assortment of […]
It’s Time to Tip the Scales on Scale Insects
With a multitude of different varieties, it would seem that these common shade tree and shrub pests would not be as overlooked as they are. What often happens however, is that these insects go undetected until damage or even death to the tree or shrub as already occurred. If you examine the damaged plant you […]