Recent content by sandbur

Some trees have that natural growth tendency. Some are reaching for more daylight. Some will have limbs start to ‘settle’ with a fruit load. You can tie limbs down to a cage or I use a piece of wire with a hook on each end. Or you can buy or make limb spreaders.

I carried the step ladder down near a pond to prune some apple trees. The single digits and wind were too much. There is always tomorrow.

At daybreak, one young one is eating grass and eyeing up the bird feeder. Others are cleaning up the twigs from my pruning. Will these deer be used to my scent and more vulnerable in deer season or will they only tolerate my scent around the orchard or lawn?

Most of our wild trees in an open environment look like this. Multi stemmed or lots of lower branches provide shade to reduce sunscauld. If sunscauld damage occurs, there are other limbs to fill in. Most of our wild crabs are along creeks or ditch bottoms. I live in more of a prairie type...

That trunk should have painted white, all of the way around.

East side winter burner sunscauld. This tree had some shading on South or SW, but exposed on the east. This tree was mostly planted, caged, and ignored.

Sunscauld damage or winter burn on another old tree. I am trying to nurse along a rootsuckers for future grafting. This tree is a Red Baron. You don’t hear of these older varieties too often Hazen is another variety that comes to mind.

I started pruning today and found some things. My oldest tree that we planted is now hollow on two sides. It is a chestnut crab. I have about 10 root suckers from it for new trees through the years. It’s knees and back are giving out, kind of like old habitat managers! :) I can remember...

I started pruning today and found some things. My oldest tree that we planted is now hollow on two sides. It is a chestnut crab. I have about 10 root suckers from it for new trees through the years. It’s knees and back are giving out, kind of like old habitat managers! :)

From the looks of the location, that was probably a planted and not a wild tree. I wonder if that is rootstock growth with the multi trunks. The tree we call Courthouse crab is a rootstock. Bark surface, leaves, and fruit allow us to still see some of the flowering crab on top and on one trunk.

The older conifer stand is past prime but still works well for winter cover in deep snow areas. I carried these spruce in with containers to high spots in an old hog pasture. I was young and ambitious then. These were volunteer white spruce .

Here is a 15 year old or a bit older versus a nearly 30 year old conifer planting in the back right. Yup, that’s a crab apple up front. An alfalfa and corn stubble field is behind me. The deer trail leads straight to the conifers.

I use 5-6 foot diameter cages if using cement reinforcing wire. There opening is much larger and deer some what reach through it. If you use wire with 2x4 inch openings, 3 foot diameter can work. I have some old welded wire that is probably 30 years old and I keep reusing it. The new flimsy...

Dang, I am a sucker for applecrabs and some of those hardy Canadian/ Alaskan varieties. Wish I were younger. I only have a handful of trees to topwork. A friend is bringing me some scion from Dearborns Unknown, Prairie Sensation, 922 End, Coopersville Crab, and a few others. Some of this...

Valuation and taxes will go up! Does that mean that foggy and my taxes in the same county go up or down? Want to buy more at $16,000 per acre? ;)