November on the Seneca River bend at Muskrat Bay is bare trees, dark water and a wind that tells you plainly what is coming. Whelan Property Services LLC uses those weeks to close one season and open the next — final cleanups on the lawns it mowed all summer, then plows mounted and driveways back on the list. Through the growing months the company mows, trims and edges; through the cold ones it clears drives and walks after each storm passes. Clay does not do half-measures in either direction, and neither does the schedule. A property looked after all twelve months never wears that neglected look come March.