Follow these guidelines to get your trees, yard ready for hurricane or tropical storm

No one wants flying yard debris to injure someone or damage property during a hurricane. Planning ahead can protect your property and your neighbors' property.

Here are tips for preparing trees and your yard for hurricanes and tropical storms:

General tips for your yard as hurricane approaches

• Take in hanging pots and baskets. Secure or take in pots from shade houses.
• Secure young trees with additional stakes.
• Don’t remove fruit. If you put it in a trash pile and the pile isn’t picked up, the fruit may fly around in the wind.
• Tree-dwelling bromeliads, staghorn ferns and orchids can be secured with fishing line.
• Take in or tie up piles of yard or construction debris.
• Take in all garden furniture, grills, tiki torches and other outdoor items. (Do not sink furniture in swimming pool.)
• Consider removing gates and trellises.
• Outdoor structures, such as sheds, should be anchored.

Trim your trees well ahead of storm

Don’t trim trees and shrubs after a hurricane warning or watch is announced. Don’t take vegetation to the curb, either. Trash pickups will be suspended and your trimmings can become dangerous projectiles propelled by the storm’s high winds.

• Trim trees before storms threaten. Many municipalities have “amnesty” weeks before storm season, when you can deposit more than the allowable limit of yard debris. Call municipalities for more information.
• Call a professional. Trees trimmed by a professional arborist are far less likely to fall.
• Thinning a tree allows wind to blow through its canopy, offering less wind resistance in a storm. Prune young trees to create a single leader, which will grow into a strong trunk.
• Minimize damage to mature trees by removing weak branches and reducing limb lengths.
• Hatracked trees become sails. Removing a tree’s canopy encourages bushy growth, making a tree top-heavy and wind-resistant. Hatracking also is illegal.
• "Lifted" trees lead to broken branches. “Lifting” is a practice in which lower branches are removed for clearance underneath. It can cause branch breakage and makes trees top-heavy.
• Prune before a storm threatens. If trash pickup doesn’t get to your curb before the storm, you’ve created a pile of potential missiles.
• Coconuts behave like cannonballs in high winds. Remove them well before a storm. If trees are too tall, hire a tree trimmer.

Tips for pruning trees to decrease chance of it being uprooted

Having your foliage thinned and trees pruned allows wind to flow freely through branches, decreasing the chance of the plant being uprooted.

But trees must be pruned properly to prevent damage.

• Never cut a branch flush with the trunk. Cut to the outside of the branch collar, where the branch meets the trunk. Properly done, this technique does not injure the trunk.
• Don’t remove large limbs unless they are obstructing traffic, pedestrians or arehazardous. Avoid removing branches that are more than 2 inches in diameter.
• Avoid “liontailing," or removing smaller branches on large branches. This leaves the foliage only on the ends of branches so the limbs look like a lion’s tail.
• Avoid  removing lower branches of trees, which can make trees more vulnerable to wind damage and rot.
• Palms don’t need hurricane pruning. They are adapted to wind storms. Removing fronds is of no benefit and is detrimental to the palm. Even dying fronds benefit the health of the palm and should not be removed until completely brown.
• Only coconuts and large palm seeds should be removed from palms during hurricane season.

Don't get hurt after the storm

• Do not attempt to use chainsaws to cut down or trim fallen trees. The branches and limbs are under a great deal of pressure, and only a trained person should attempt to clean up after the storm.
• Do not remove trees or limbs leaning on power lines. This should be done only by trained powerline professionals who work for a power company.