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Transporting Potted Trees

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PoorSand

5 year old buck +
The 2' - 3' whips I potted this spring have gotten a bit out of control on me. They are 6' - 8' tall now, and still growing like weeds. This fall, I need to move them hundreds of miles to plant them. Anybody have any advice on the best way to protect them during the move? (I know, it's a nice problem to have. No complaints here.)

The mix was 54% composted pine bark fines, 18% sphagnum peat moss, 16% rice hulls, 12% masonry sand, lots of 60 day Osmocote. and three tablespoons of lime per pot, which I followed up monthly with sixty day 44-0-0 polymer coated urea. The fifty cent Walmart bags seem to do just as well as the more expensive growing containers.
 
Sound like you got about $50000 in T and M invested rent a trailer
 
If you wait until they go dormant, you can transport them in an open trailer. I have a similar situation where I transport mine about 80 miles. If they have green leaves you need something enclosed, but once dormant you can transport whips in an open trailer with no problem.

Thanks,

Jack
 
Thanks guy, all great advice. I only paid $2.94 each, delivered, for the trees, but I notice that they sell for more than that around here at this size. I have 300 or so to move.
 
I've laid potted leafed trees down in back of truck covered with tarp and a few landscaping bricks and driven them over an hour away before but it was in late spring not mid summer. Don't know if heat would be a big issue or not, mine turned out fine with no leaf damage or shock.
With the 300 you might just want to rent a U-Haul box truck.
 
I make the annual pilgrimage from my backyard to ranch with a covered trailer

I usually transport ~200 trees in 1-3 gallon containers first week of november

Whatever you decide, I would cover them in some way

bill
 
I agree with the others....your gonna want to ensure the leafs are not ripped off or branches damaged by being exposed to the wind....however you can best accomplish that. 300....that's a bunch!
 
Turn them into 4’ bare root whips in the spring and ship them. Do you have to plant in the fall?
 
I realize that I wrote “fall planting”, while having “fall dormant planting” in mind. My planting help is scheduled to be on location during the last couple weekends in October, after the leaves have fallen, but before the ground freezes. You guys reinforced that it is best for us not to plant the trees before then. All good so far.

Since the whips have gotten too tall for vertical transport to be a realistic option with my truck and trailer, I’ve decided to go with the suggestion to haul them horizontally. I was initially worried that if I transported that way, the trees would get damaged during the journey, but now I realize that once they are dormant, I can think of them as basically bareroot trees that happen to have their roots in pots. The treatment they will receive from me will probably be as good as the treatment they received on their journey to me in the first place.

The reason I am planting them this fall is that I have to make room for next year's bulk orders.
 
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One more note. I sometimes transport a few of my rootmaker trees in 3 gal containers in my CRV. I put the rear seats down and lay a couple 4x6s across the back of the car. I up the trees in at an angle where the pot is leaning on one 4x6 and the bottom of the pot is against the next. These are fully leaved trees that I can't transport in my open trailer. Just letting you know there are options between vertical and horizontal.

Pruning the trees as soon as the go dormant won't hurt at all. Pick a nice bud that will form the new central leader and make an angled cut just above it.

Thanks,

Jack
 
Well... some of the whips are now over eight feet tall. They have stopped putting on height and are clearly hardening off now. I grew some of those tall ones in Walmart bags, not because I thought they were the best containers, but rather because the root systems they came with from the nursery were too large for anything I had on hand to put them into and I needed containers right away. It will be interesting to see what those root systems are like. I'm thinking we are about three weeks from leaf fall here, which is when I plan to start putting them in the ground. We certainly have an abundance of soil moisture here this year -- not something I can normally report on sand.
 
I move mine as yoderjac describes. Horizontal, with a 4x4 allowing just a slight elevation of the pot which seems to keep the dirt stable and intact. I have jumped the gun a little bit in the past, causing some leave loss / damage. Honestly, it did not seem to set the trees back in spring, or, at least not enough for me to notice. Good luck, that's a lot of holed to dig!
 
I just remembered that I forgot to tell you guys how it all turned out once I got the trees to their destination. Since we already had all the posts in the ground and had already dropped off all the enclosures by them, all I had to do early on the morning of planting day was to drop off the potted trees at each spot per my orchard map. Our soil was saturated from unusually heavy October rains, and it is always very easy to dig in anyway. Four of us got all the trees in the ground and protected in six hours and then grilled out afterwards. It rained like the dickens for the next two days.
 
Nice
 
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