Residential · Ocean County, NJ · · By Nick Sheridan
Most of the leaves in Ocean County come down over three or four weeks in November. The oaks hang on longest. By the time the last of them are off the trees, the gutters on a wooded street are full, and the downspouts are the part nobody can see.
Gutter cleaning and downspout flushing is on the Quarterly Maintenance Plan twice a year, spring and fall. The fall visit is the one that protects the house through winter. Spring clears out the seed pods and the pollen.
What a blocked downspout does over a Shore winter
From the ground, you usually can't tell. Leaves and pine needles slide down to the elbow at the top of the downspout and pack it solid, and the gutter above it still looks clear. Water that can't get down goes over the back edge of the gutter instead, onto the fascia board and the end of the roof deck. That wood stays wet for weeks at a time in November and December, and wet wood rots.
Then it freezes. A gutter full of standing water turns into a gutter full of ice, and ice is heavy. It pulls the hangers out of the fascia and bends the gutter away from the house. When it thaws, the water drops straight down at the foundation instead of running out through the downspout and away from the house. On an older Shore home with a crawl space, that water finds its way in.
Salt air makes all of this faster. Seams and screws corrode, and a gutter that was fine three years ago starts to leak at the joints.
What you can check from the ground
Wait for the next hard rain and walk around the house.
- Look at the bottom of each downspout. Water should be running out of it. If nothing comes out while it's raining hard, the run is blocked somewhere.
- Look at the gutter edge. Water sheeting over the front, or dripping behind the gutter against the house, means it's full.
- Check the mulch and the soil under the gutter line. A trench or a splash line means water's been coming over the edge for a while.
- Check the fascia board behind the gutter for dark stains or peeling paint.
- Look for anything growing in the gutter. A seedling means a year of soil has built up.
You don't need to get on a ladder for any of that, and we'd rather you didn't. A ladder on wet ground in November is how a gutter job turns into a hospital visit.
Pine needles and the elbow
On the bay side and anywhere with pines, the problem is needles, not leaves. The photo at the top of this post is a gutter in Barnegat packed with them. Needles slip past gutter guards and pack the elbow at the top of the downspout. That's why we do more than scoop the gutter. We flush every downspout with water until it runs clear at the bottom, and if it won't clear, we take the elbow apart and clear it by hand.
Gutters on the Quarterly Maintenance Plan
Gutter and downspout cleaning is on the spring and fall quarterly visits. On the fall one, we also change the HVAC filter and work through the handyman and light landscaping list. Low ceiling fans too. The garage door gets its tune-up on that same visit. Every visit ends with time-stamped before and after photos and a written report, so you can see what came out of the gutters without climbing up to look.
When to book it
Book the fall cleaning once most of the leaves are down, which around here usually means late November into early December. If you have oaks, wait for them. To get it done before the first hard freeze, book it by the first week of December.
If you're anywhere in Ocean or Monmouth County and the downspouts didn't run in the last storm, call us at (732) 362-4425 or request a quote. We're licensed, bonded, and insured, NJHIC #13VH13963600.
