Advice on planting trees.

[TripleR]

We are just finishing up 1700 trees of various types on one farm and will put about 1000 on another beginning tomorrow. My brother is doing the planting with a dibble bar we made from patterns on various sites. Years ago when we reforested larger sections, we hired a crew. When we called this time they wanted the ground preppred and marked then they would charge 80 cents a tree.

As mentioned, you can toe them in, but we are keeping the roots damp and storing them in a cool dry place like we did before and they will be good for about two weeks. We will be using Poast for grass control as our areas have no weeds and won't hurt the trees.

 

[sld]

What about just running a middle buster in the lines you want to plant?

 

[Deerherd]

What about just running a middle buster in the lines you want to plant?

I thought about using my drainage plow but I think it would create more work, that's a lot of filling in. I ordered up a couple of those planting tools.

Looking at it this afternoon it's dried out a lot. I'll disc it one more time and use the drag harrow. Plant the trees, seed with clover and cultipack it.

Now I need a water tank......

 

[Ranger Rick]

Now I need a water tank......

Look on Craigs list for an IBC water tank. They hold 275 to 350 gallons. You should be able to find one for $50 to $100. They are used to ship all kind of liquids. I have one and use the tractor to move it around. It has a valve at the bottom and you can fix it up to connect to a hose with just a couple of PVC fittings. I bought a 12 volt transfer pump to get give me water pressure, but for a long while I just used gravity to water my trees.
Rick

 

[BHD]

IF the ground is not froze, I would scrape the snow off or if it is not so deep it is a problem, go plant them

here is a picture of when I planted about 3000 trees, we put the weed barrior cloth on later,

 

[Deerherd]

Look on Craigs list for an IBC water tank. They hold 275 to 350 gallons. You should be able to find one for $50 to $100. They are used to ship all kind of liquids. I have one and use the tractor to move it around. It has a valve at the bottom and you can fix it up to connect to a hose with just a couple of PVC fittings. I bought a 12 volt transfer pump to get give me water pressure, but for a long while I just used gravity to water my trees.
Rick

Funny you mentioned those, I found these a few days ago and can pick up one tomorrow.

275 gal. gallon water tote tanks

Looks like I could put it on my forks and rig up some kind of boom/electric pump. That way in the heat of the summer I can drive up and down the rows in air conditioned comfort and water the trees while listening to the radio. That should work!

 

[Deerherd]

here is a picture of when I planted about 3000 trees, we put the weed barrior cloth on later,

That's great! I can see how that is a fast way to plant a lot of trees.

 

[ruffdog]

Years back we would get the WI DNR tree planter that was pulled by a tractor. It is the only way to go for large areas. We had 3 fields at about 10 acres each.
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EQUIPMENT RENTAL - Land Conservation Division - Dunn County 

 

[BHD]

also when planting them (bare rooted) can be easy to J root, and they normally will die in a few years, or that was my experience, I planted some hard wood trees and they grew for about 5 years and were looking great and killed over, no apparent other problems,
these were planted before I built the tree planter, a few years, in the yard,

the rows I use the tree planter, I had close to 98% survival rate with the weed cloth on, we went through one of the worst drouths that summer, only 2" of water during the spring, summer, and fall total that year was about 5 inches, watered them once, the trees with out the weed cloth was about 4% survival, (I had a small area where I ran out) so the next year I had to replant and put down the cloth.in that area. that was on my own extra area,


J rooting is when the roots of the tree are bent over or even bent 180 degrees on the bottom of the hole,
http://classes.forestry.oregonstate.../1993 Haase et al TPL Effect of root form.pdf

https://nurserycoop.auburn.edu/PDF files/BSSRC10.pdf

one of the problems I have heard about with using a post hole digger auger is that the auger can compact the sides of the hole in some soils that the roots have difficulty to grow past that hole, kind of of like a root bound container plant, (in my sand it is not a problem but I hear it can be in some harder soils),

on storing your trees, they will stay dormant if keep in a walk in cooler for a good wile but still best to plant as soon as possible, one year I had some time problems and I put them in a cooler for a few weeks and no problems,

 

[BHD]

also this was told to me when I was asking questions, about tree planting, and the time to plant them.

one old timer said 20 years ago,