Plant safe ice/snow melt?

General Fruit Growing
1

I’m not sure if anyone’s ever considered this before, but I was just recently thinking about what types of products I use on my driveway for melting ice/ snow. I have a number of fruit trees that are within 8 to 12 ft of my driveway, so making sure I’m not applying any products that make it into the water near my trees is important to me.

I was reading one of the safest ice melt products is made with calcium magnesium acetate (CMA), but it seems that many products blend CMA into other mixes instead of using it as the sole ingredient because it doesn’t work well in extremely cold environments, and is more expensive.

Has anyone else ever considered this before, or do you consider what types of products you apply to your driveway as they may impact your fruit trees?

2

I shovel and use sand right next to the trees. you have to clean it up after the snow melts though.

Shoveling before its stepped on is the number 1 way to keep it ice free in my experience. When theres a bad snow storm me and my wife go out every 2-4 hours and shovel so its not so back breaking