How to prepare your home and garden plants ahead of winter storms
WILMINGTON, NC (WWAY) — With daytime temperatures on Friday expected to be seasonably high in the upper 50’s, it may be your last chance to make any last-minute preps to ensure your home is ready before the frigid cold arrives this weekend.
As winter weather heads our way, it’s important to take steps now to ensure your home is adequately prepared to handle any storm impacts we could see here in the Cape Fear.
Check outdoor hoses and plumbing, and disconnect hoses from spigots to prevent freezing.
Drew King is the owner of King Plumbing and Drains, said there are several ways to keep your indoor pipes from freezing.
“Keep your cabinets open under your faucets in your bathrooms and your kitchen,” King said. “Keep those open so the heat gets under the cabinet cause usually your kitchen faucet is one an outside wall, which is colder. Also, you can leave your faucets just dripping, just a little bit. You know, it doesn’t have to be much. Just enough so the water is flowing cause water won’t freeze if it’s flowing.”
Your thermostat setting is also important: set it at the lowest comfortable temperature and change your air filters.
Old, dirty filters puts unneccesary stress on your HVAC system, forcing it to work harder to keep the warm air moving through your home.
Tiffany Wright with AAA Carolinas said it is also important to inspect all the places where indoor heat could escape.
“Check your windows, check your doors, um, you know, caulk any of those gaps that you see that’s gonna allow, um, you know, it’s gonna allow, um, you know, cold air to get in,” Wright said. “It’s gonna allow moisture to get in. Those are some things you can be thinking about.”
As for outdoor plants, any that are in containers or pots should be brought inside your garage or home.
For in-ground plants like palms or camellias that may suffer from the extreme cold or ice, Bo Metts with Farmers Supply in Wilmington recommends covering them up.
“Usually anything like an insulate cloth, which is something that we sell. I’ve actually got some kind of set up over there,” Metts said. “If you get any rainfall or any snow or anything else like that, it’ll just essentially make sure that it’s covering the plant, keeping it nice and warm. This is just going to be a permeable fabric that’s going to make sure water gets through without the wind or anything else damaging the plant.”
