Next Season Tree Planting

[ChrisA]

First, let me say how great this site is with all the input and varying experience levels of people. I am a new property owner who just discovered this site, and have immersed myself in many of the types of projects these forums discuss in detail, so am thoroughly enjoying the chance to learn from others.

Like many others, I have recently placed an order with my state DNR for a large (for me) number of bare root trees and shrubs to be delivered and planted in the spring. I also plan to purchase additional trees and shrubs from my local soil and water conservation district, once their annual sale opens in the next month. All told, I am expecting between 700-800 trees and shrubs, including smaller seedlings, which also include 200 five year transplants (white pine and balsam). Last year, my first year owning the property, my wife and I planted about 350 trees, albeit nearly all of the smaller seedling size that could quickly be planted with a dibble bar.

My simple challenge this year is timing. I expect both DNR and conservation district trees to arrive within a fairly narrow window. It is just myself and my wife that will be doing the planting, and I am looking for any ways that I can spread this challenge out a bit, specifically the digging for some of these bigger trees. I have read on other forums about potential risks of pre-digging holes and the challenges with the holes drying out and getting hard, so curious if there is a way to do this. I know in the end, we’ll get it done either way, but any amount of pre-work I can do up front (e.g. cutting cages, staking locations, digging holes etc.) would be very helpful to understand.

Appreciate any feedback anyone wishes to share.

Chris

 

[trampledbyturtles]

Dude congrats on the chutzpah,

Pre-cut cages and mats will help.

But find yourself a bobcat with a 24" post hole digger and save yourself a year or 2 of life.

Forget about the dibble bar, it's where the gov sends trees to die.

 

[yoderjac]

For trees I cage, I like to use a single T-post and Re-mesh. I pre-cut my cages well before planting. The remesh stands on its own and does not need posts for support. A single T-post holds it in place so it does not get pushed. I cable tie one side to the post and bend the cut wire around the post on the other end. I can then easily unbend them to open the cage for maintenance.

I have a good method using an auger on my tractor to plant Rootmaker trees from 3 gal RB2 containers. That may not work as well for bare root. I can't say for sure. I can say that if you use an auger and have clay soil, make sure you use a hand rake to rough up the inside of the hole as the auger can cause glazing that may be tough to penetrate by the roots.

You can cut your landscape material ahead of time for caged trees as well.

Thanks,

Jack

 

[BuckSutherland]

Are you in MN?? I saw the MN ministry of outdoors had 5 year old transplants. My land is about 15 miles east of Leech Lake. I started this thread a couple weeks ago.

Winning the battle to establish conifers

And a LONG battle it has been... Bought our property in 2012, after it was select cut and lost in foreclosure (mostly mature red oak). For the next 6 years we attempted to plant conifers to thicken the woods up cause we had very few. Mostly small plugs 4, 6 and 10s. We planted thousands...

habitat-talk.com

I think your white pines will be candy and browsed to death if you dont put a cages around them immediately with decent deer numbers. I would highly suggest drastically cutting back on the number of trees and increasing the amount of care given to each tree (full sun, weed mat, cage, plant larger trees). We lost over 5 years of learning things the hard way.

 

[BuckSutherland]

Last year I bought all of my cages from Tractor Supply for $54.99 a roll cause they price matched Blains Fleet Farm. I get 4ft x 100ft roll of 14 gauge welded wire. I cut 10 cages per roll. So all I do is unroll it, measure every 10 feet and make two snips and keep on measuring (easiest for measuring otherwise the roll curls up). Then set the tape measure down and go by and snip all 10 cages, and then come back and connect them 5 times evenly across each cage. I usually stake them down with (2) 5/16" electric fence post pushed in upside down. Holds them nicely and in 2 years has been 100% effective against deer.


Gotta have a weed mat though. 100% mandatory in my opinion. The best thing you can do for a young tree is eliminate the competition so it can establish roots. Get it in the sun and smoother the weeds and grass. White pines really took off FAST for me doing this. I like the Dewit 4x300 5 oz weed mat roll and 6" landscape staples to hold down where the cage doesnt. I might make a little stand or post configuration to cut all the weed mats at waist height this year instead of bending over.

Cage+weed mat+full sun = success (this white pine was about 8" tall at planting in May of 2019, and its now 3 feet tall. Im thinking 4.5-5 feet by next fall.)

 

[ChrisA]

Thanks for all the helpful responses guys. A lot of good info here.

Jack, that is what I was getting at on the pre-digging holes......we do have pretty heavy clay-like soil in many places, so concerned about how hard the edges would get if I dug, or augered as suggested, a week or more in advance. I am interpreting your suggestion to rake the edges at the time I dig the holes, to soften that up a bit. If I do this, is that enough or will I also need to soften it up again on the day of planting? Intent is to make planting day(s) as efficient as possible, but certainly don’t want to risk a bad outcome by getting careless.

Buck, looks like you’ve got a great recipe for the white pines. And yes, I am in MN, just north of Fergus Falls, and bought those exact trees from where you noted, the 5 year old transplants, which was one reason I have so many.....DNR only sells in minimum of 500 for total order, and when I saw the larger trees, and them indicating this was a one year only offering, I jumped on it. I did “only“ buy the minimum, 100 whites and 100 balsams, with some ROD and Juneberry the balance of my order. I do have a pretty high deer density in my area, and my initial thought was to simply bud cap the whites, as we planted a bunch in an open pasture last year and did that and it worked well. Had a few get nipped on branches, but they recovered this summer and no leaders were lost. That said, I intend to plant these new ones near the edge of the woods where I’m confident the deer traffic is markedly higher. My thinking was to cage as many as I can and bud cap the rest, but perhaps I need to re-think that idea. Might need to draw on the chutzpah that Turtles noted, or chalk it up as being naive. Haha.

Also appreciate the info on the mats and cage specifics too. Like the idea of bending wire so i can get in and out of them as needed. Will keep you posted as I continue this journey and after planting. Thanks for all the helpful tips guys.

Chris

 

[H20fwler]

To help offset some of your caging cost try and find some old used farm fence, old fence posts, electric fence posts. I second using something with an auger on it for digging a lot of holes fast or get a couple high school kids to help.

 

[Ben.MN/WI]

I've had good luck planting MN and WI DNR seedlings with a dibble bar. Bud caps are required for white and red pines on my place, which is why I stick with white spruce now more often than not! Caging them would be best, but I've planted several thousand that are doing fine despite not being caged. As you mentioned those planted near deer cover do get browsed and rubbed more severely than those found further from typical deer cover. Most of my plantings have been on field edges where the ground was cropped the previous year. I don't use any weed mats or any herbicides after planting and success has been generally high.

 

[ChrisA]

I did plant a lot of seedlings last year just using a dibble bar, and I didn’t think it was too bad, but those were the small red dogwood cuttings and others of that size. My concern this year is in the bigger size with 5 year old transplants. I do like the auger idea, and am hoping I could do much of that in advance, but again then to my questions around the hole getting hardened and how best to deal with that. As for the mats etc., we didn’t use them last year on our pines either and they seemed fine, but after reading here, and seeing Buck’s pics above, hard to argue with the results. This seems like something I want to try this year. Good to hear a consistent message here of ensuring whatever is planted is protected in high deer areas, and benefits of controlling weeds. Neighboring land owner thought I was crazy to bud cap and mulch my pines last year.

 

[Bill]

700 trees And I’m complaining to myself about ordering about 25 apples.

have you considered digging the holes a few weeks ahead of time and then just filling them back in? Always easier to re-dig something then it was to dig the first time.

 

[TreeDaddy]

I have planted thousands of trees with a dibble bar .

I then learned about the Wolverine Tree Spade from Cavey( member of this forum)

The Dibble ,like the rototiller, is retired.........

bill

 

[TreeDaddy]

This......

bill

 

[Mortenson]

Don't forget Cavey's bushpro hiballer. Awesome little shovel.

 

[ChrisA]

I did read that thread, and will be buying the Wolverine for certain.

 

[Gravel Road]

I have planted thousands of trees with a dibble bar .

I then learned about the Wolverine Tree Spade from Cavey( member of this forum)

The Dibble ,like the rototiller, is retired.........

bill

I don't know how I missed hearing about the Wolverine, but looks like I'll be out $65 real soon

 

[Gravel Road]

I tried a new step (to me) since I had some trees to fall plant. This summer I spot sprayed 3-5 ft circles with gly, and in October went back to plant and was amazed at the difference. It had been very dry this fall but the soil was moist and dug very easy for a heavy soil. I had more trees than spots so had to dig in non prepped areas. Only a few feet away the ground was like concrete and dry as a bone. Amazing what getting rid of the grass will do.
It takes pre-planning so will probably be to late for you this year, but it's something to consider for future projects.

 

[jsasker007]

I have a wolverine too, and i agree that it's better than anything else i have used to plant by hand. You would think a shovel's a shovel, but it's better built and just plain works.

 

[BuckSutherland]

Most of my plantings have been on field edges where the ground was cropped the previous year. I don't use any weed mats or any herbicides after planting and success has been generally high.

I can get my trees to survive just fine in the Chippewa forest without a weed mat or herbicide. What I want to see is the best and fastest results possible. Most of my plantings have been into THICK ferns, grasses, brush and young regeneration. By about the 3rd week in June, my woods canopies out 99% of young seedlings without some assistance. The extra months of added sunlight and the benefit of the weed mat smothering the competition was well worth it in time, money and effort to me. I feel like I am at least quadrupling (or more) the amount of time my young trees are spending in the sun and rapidly speeding up the process of them setting roots. I wish I knew a year in advance exactly where I would plant a tree next year cause I would spray with roundup to kill the grass a year ahead for sure. I urge everyone to try some type of weed mat or suppression. Hell, the first things I used were some cardboard boxes in 2018, with a couple dead limbs to weigh them down. I am full on convinced 100% by 2020, that I wont go without it.

 

[BuckSutherland]

Don't forget Cavey's bushpro hiballer. Awesome little shovel.

View attachment 32843

And now I have to decide between the shovel that you and Bill posted. I have been looking to get something new. Mine is pretty well shot after last seasons beating. I generally have lots of roots to cut through.

 

[Mortenson]

Start with the Wolverine. I got them both. It's stronger, heavier, and sharper. You'll use the Bushpro only for small digging with smaller plants. It's what you'd use if and only if you can get away with it. Planting my plums last year, I began by using the Wolverine until realizing I could get by with the Bushpro. King of Spades is the Cadillac (more like Kenworth) but I think the Wolverine is very close and quite a bit more affordable last I checked.