Agriculture Reference
In-Depth Information
or contact the nursery you are buying from before digging the holes. Have
a shovel on hand during planting to make any necessary adjustments to the
hole dimensions. Do not prune roots or cut down root balls in order to fit
them into a hole. Instead, make the hole wider. When planting large numbers
of trees, you may find it helpful to have the holes dug before the trees arrive
from the nursery.
Use a hand shovel to break away any smooth, compacted layers on the
sides of the holes (glazing) before setting in the trees. Glazing is most likely
to occur when soils are wet, contain large amounts of clay or silt, and when
an auger is used to dig the holes. The dense, smooth glazing can inhibit root
growth and interfere with water movement.
Make the holes deep enough to set the plants at the same depth as they
grew in the nursery. Planting too deep or too shallow can stunt or kill plants.
Because the soil and the trees will settle somewhat in the planting holes,
you may choose to plant trees slightly shallower than they grew in the nurs-
ery. In some cases, trees with interstems are planted deeply enough to place
the lower graft union at or slightly below the soil surface. When using this
strategy, use only trees that have had the interstem grafted very low on the
rootstock so as not to plant too deeply.
A common recommendation is to form a firm, cone-shaped mound of
soil in the bottom of the hole to drape the tree roots over. This strategy
works well for bare root trees and small plantings. The idea is to set the
tree roots on the cone and backfill the planting hole, evenly distributing the
roots around the hole and providing maximum support. When planting hun-
dreds or thousands of trees, however, the method is usually too slow and
labor intensive to be practicable. Holes for containerized or ball-and-burlap
trees need to be just deep enough to receive the root ball and maintain the
height at the same depth the tree grew in the nursery. You can make the
holes wider, however, so that you can make adjustments to the plant's loca-
tion.
