Ok thanks for the note.
Winning the battle to establish conifers
- Thread starter BuckSutherland
- Start date
BuckSutherland
5 year old buck +
My local SWCD had some in one gallon pots last year for $10 each. They looked nice. They sold bundles of 25 bareroots for $37.50 (15-18" tall). In the fall of 2021, Itasca greenhouse will have 5,000 available in the ABP size. They are large plugs and gonna cost $5.10 each if you order under 100. $2.45 if you order more then 100. They have $150 minimum order. They always have nice plugs.
Here are the one gallons from last year. I really like these one gallon pots.
Here are the one gallons from last year. I really like these one gallon pots.
Knehrke
5 year old buck +
I've had some issues with one gallon pots from commercial vendors and amending the soil. My RM grown trees are all in a 50/50 mix with native soil now, and I seem to be seeing better results. What's your take on this?
I'm hoping that my wife and I can make it over soon to put aluminum screen caps on the terminal leaders of all the volunteer pines that have cropped up around a small existing grove. Deer season just ended for us, and so management season begins immediately. I love expanding the bedding and thermal cover, but the deer destroy our young pines unless they're capped. We use a 6" wide piece of aluminum screen stapled to the leader four times from Jan-April, and we've had a bunch of trees make it to almost above browse height over the past few years of doing this. We're close to where we want to be.
I'm hoping that my wife and I can make it over soon to put aluminum screen caps on the terminal leaders of all the volunteer pines that have cropped up around a small existing grove. Deer season just ended for us, and so management season begins immediately. I love expanding the bedding and thermal cover, but the deer destroy our young pines unless they're capped. We use a 6" wide piece of aluminum screen stapled to the leader four times from Jan-April, and we've had a bunch of trees make it to almost above browse height over the past few years of doing this. We're close to where we want to be.
PatinPA
5 year old buck +
Had the same problem with the wooly adelgid. Ended up cutting all the hemlocks down while they were still alive. That really cold winter we had 2 years ago seemed to kill it off for me. I check the bottoms of the branches of all the younger hemlocks that remain and haven't noticed any there. Fingers crossed.
BuckSutherland
5 year old buck +
Last year was the first year using the one gallon pots for me. I bought 10 white cedar ($10). 100% are alive and looking damn good so far. Hopefully they pull through the winter unscathed. Their first winter for me. I am putting about 25 white pine 1 gallon ($10), 20 white cedar 2 gallon ($13), 8 black hills spruce 2 gallon($15), and 3 meyer spruce 2 gallon ($13) in this upcoming season. I expect I might lose a few.
I use 4x6 index cards to bud cap. Have gotten quite good at doing that job and sometimes make some creative caps. Its quick, easy and it works good.
Knehrke
5 year old buck +
I tried index cards our first year, but our deer population is very, very high because of a large adjacent park, and they thought they were hors d'oeuvres. We went to wire screen and it was somewhat better, but the deer still pull it off the occasional tree. I want to scruff them, shake them, and say, "Don't you know this is for you?".
The wife and I capped hundreds of evergreens yesterday. Unfortunately, for some reason this year we were too late for the white pines, and there was selective browsing on every single one of them. Not unrecoverable, but boy was my wife peeved. I told her they were too small to remove their protection this past summer, but this fell on deaf ears.
The wife and I capped hundreds of evergreens yesterday. Unfortunately, for some reason this year we were too late for the white pines, and there was selective browsing on every single one of them. Not unrecoverable, but boy was my wife peeved. I told her they were too small to remove their protection this past summer, but this fell on deaf ears.
Auger
A good 3 year old buck
I use busted up sheets of drywall around the base of hardwood/conifer transplants. Nice way to dispose of project refuse and pretty easy to find. I always put the brown paper side up- not sure if it adds much for nutrients but it sure eliminates weed/grass pressure for a solid year and a half
BuckSutherland
5 year old buck +
I planted these ABP white pine plugs from Itasca greenhouse in late April, 2019. They were about the size of a 20 oz pop bottle on average.
Approximately 26.5 months later this is what the best ones look like. I have them in 4 foot cages with a 4 x 4 dewitt 5oz landscape fabric for a weed mat with some woods mulch on them. Would love to see what they could do with some rain. My woods can really pump out the pine and oak, but spruce has been much tougher to grow. Next year a little triple 19 is getting injected under every single weed mat in my woods cause it really boosted my oak trees this year. Hope it can help my spruce trees along the most.
Approximately 26.5 months later this is what the best ones look like. I have them in 4 foot cages with a 4 x 4 dewitt 5oz landscape fabric for a weed mat with some woods mulch on them. Would love to see what they could do with some rain. My woods can really pump out the pine and oak, but spruce has been much tougher to grow. Next year a little triple 19 is getting injected under every single weed mat in my woods cause it really boosted my oak trees this year. Hope it can help my spruce trees along the most.
BuckSutherland
5 year old buck +
^^^ I have done a couple hundred bud caps per year for a few years. I get about 95+% protection for the central leader. There is less then 5% that gets pulled off by the deer. I use 4x6 index cards and try to staple them on tight without going through the central leader. Try to catch some needles if/when you do it.
I have yet to see the deer destroy a tree inside a cage.
I have yet to see the deer destroy a tree inside a cage.
BuckSutherland
5 year old buck +
I use a 100 foot rolls of 2x4 welded wire 14 gauge 4 feet tall. I cut every 10 feet and get 10 cages out of a roll. I bought 7 rolls this past year for 54.99 each at tractor supply. Cheapest I have seen lately is $82.99 at tractor supply. I'm up to approximately 250 cages and have only seen 1 deer push a little on a caged white cedar, but it was a half-assed effort. 100% survivors in the cages, except a few I lost to winter burn (norways and cannan firs). I dont have a need for bigger or taller cages by me. Your mileage may vary.
Wild Thing
5 year old buck +
I have planted thousands of Norway Spruce with survival rates in the high 90 percentile range. I have never caged one and some years I have experienced browsing of all the previous years' new growth but they do seem to catch up within a year or two. Once we stopped winter feeding where we kept unusually high numbers of deer around that problem pretty much went away. I haven't planted a bare root conifer in many, many years. I plant the size 10 plugs with excellent success.
I have never had a plug pulled out of the ground when I planted them with my homemade plug planter. I have, however had some plugs pulled up when I made the hole with an auger. I have never had a deer pull up a plug that I am aware of, but I have had skunks pull them up.
The plug planting tool makes the perfect sized hole in the soft spring ground...
After the plug is planted there is no loose dirt around the hole. You would never know (nor would a deer) that the tree had been recently planted.
But when you use an auger to make the hole, there is a lot of loose dirt around the base of the seeding tree. I believe that this signals to a skunk that perhaps another critter may have buried some type of goodie there...
So they dig it up to investigate... These plugs were clearly dug up by something other than a deer.
Skunks also like to dig up my freshly planted oak seedlings...
But when I trap the skunks out - nobody digs up my trees anymore. This is only my theory, of course, as I have never actually seen skunks digging up a seedling tree, but when I have had trees dug up, I get the traps out and the problem goes away.
I have never had a plug pulled out of the ground when I planted them with my homemade plug planter. I have, however had some plugs pulled up when I made the hole with an auger. I have never had a deer pull up a plug that I am aware of, but I have had skunks pull them up.
The plug planting tool makes the perfect sized hole in the soft spring ground...
After the plug is planted there is no loose dirt around the hole. You would never know (nor would a deer) that the tree had been recently planted.
But when you use an auger to make the hole, there is a lot of loose dirt around the base of the seeding tree. I believe that this signals to a skunk that perhaps another critter may have buried some type of goodie there...
So they dig it up to investigate... These plugs were clearly dug up by something other than a deer.
Skunks also like to dig up my freshly planted oak seedlings...
But when I trap the skunks out - nobody digs up my trees anymore. This is only my theory, of course, as I have never actually seen skunks digging up a seedling tree, but when I have had trees dug up, I get the traps out and the problem goes away.
Wild Thing
5 year old buck +
I have never planted a White Pine but we do have quite a few mature WP on our property and new seedlings pop up around them every year. When we were winter feeding or when deer numbers were high a WP seedling didn't stand a chance of surviving. I did get some to grow well though by placing a cage over them... When they grow tall enough that the terminal bud is above deer height, I remove the cage and place it over another seedling white pine.
The deer may browse the unprotected trees but as long as the terminal end is still growing they can't really hurt the tree. If the bucks rub them, of course, that is a different story.
It is time to move these cages to some new seedlings - they are tall enough now to make it on their own.
I might add that our deer numbers have been down for the past few years and we have white pine coming up all over the property and doing well. They seem to be the fastest growing conifers around here. Red Pine grow pretty fast also. I have had quite a few red pine survive without being caged but I have also caged a lot of them. I have planted some white spruce and blue spruce and have never seen any of them browsed by deer.
The deer may browse the unprotected trees but as long as the terminal end is still growing they can't really hurt the tree. If the bucks rub them, of course, that is a different story.
It is time to move these cages to some new seedlings - they are tall enough now to make it on their own.
I might add that our deer numbers have been down for the past few years and we have white pine coming up all over the property and doing well. They seem to be the fastest growing conifers around here. Red Pine grow pretty fast also. I have had quite a few red pine survive without being caged but I have also caged a lot of them. I have planted some white spruce and blue spruce and have never seen any of them browsed by deer.
Bassattackr
5 year old buck +
Wildthing - Thanks for sharing! Where do you get your evergreen plugs at?
Wild Thing
5 year old buck +
I have purchased them from both Itasca Greenhouse and North Central Reforestation - both in MN.
Unfortunately, the original owners of NCR sold their business to crooks who eventually went out of business, so if I were to buy them again I would get them at Itasca.
Unfortunately, the original owners of NCR sold their business to crooks who eventually went out of business, so if I were to buy them again I would get them at Itasca.
BuckSutherland
5 year old buck +
Some of my 2 gallon white cedars planted this year on April 24th. I have watered these with about 60 gallons of water each this year (all by carrying 5 gallon pails). They have a cage, weed mat, and have a bunch of mulch to smoother the competition. A few of them have really put out some nice growth. I paid $13 each from Blue Earth County SWCD tree sale. Planted them up on a hill cause I am trying to create a premo bedding area that blocks the predominant NW wind for the deer and gives them good visual in front with some heavy cover on the sides. I planted 20 of them. Thats a lot of water. I just hope they all make it. Currently in D3 (extreme drought) for our area. They are gonna get a dose of fertilizer in the spring. Impressive 1st year growth on some of them.
BuckSutherland
5 year old buck +
White pine ABP plug from Itasca greenhouse. Planted a little under 28 months ago. Cage, mat, mulch. Instant success.
Teeder
5 year old buck +
Wildthing - the picture above with the dugout hole under the tube looks familiar. What ive done to combat this is to cut a couple stakes and drive them in sideways in front of the tube. I usually cut them from a red maple or poplar sapling, because I have zillions of them popping up.
