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  • From: Richard Robinson <rrobinson AT nasw.org>
  • To: Market Farming <market-farming AT lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: Re: [Market-farming] digging lots of small holes
  • Date: Fri, 26 Mar 2010 14:45:12 -0400

The planting bar is a one-inch thick, eight-inch wide, ten-inch deep wedge
with a footrest on top for driving it into the soil and a long handle for
manipulating it. It weighs about ten pounds. Part of the stress is that I
often have to throw the thing into the soil to get it through the sod. (I
could, and should, sharpen it, although there are many small stones in the
soil that make that problematic as well.)

When planting with the bar, you get a wedge-shaped "hole". The tree roots go
in, and you close the hole by moving the bar back a few inches, step it back
into the soil, and rock it top and bottom to close the tree's hole.

What I am contemplating is instead drilling a 4-6" wide circular hole, about
10 inches deep.

--
Richard Robinson
http://www.nasw.org/users/rrobinson/


On Fri, 26 Mar 2010 13:04:01 -0500, Casey & Teena wrote:
> Could you shed some light on the size of holes you are digging?  My guess
> would be that the reason the bar is causing so much trouble with your
> shoulders is because of the weight of it.  The powered post hole digger
>would
> be even worse.
>
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Richard Robinson" <rrobinson AT nasw.org>
> To: "Market Farming" <market-farming AT lists.ibiblio.org>
> Sent: Friday, March 26, 2010 10:23 AM
> Subject: [Market-farming] digging lots of small holes
>
>
>> In a few weeks I will be planting about 300 Christmas trees. For the past 7
>> years, I have been using a planting bar, essentially a wedge on a stick,
>> which is the common way to do this chore. But every year my arms and
>> shoulders are ruined for about a week after, and this year I am going into
>> the season with a damaged shoulder, and am hoping to avoid using the
>> planting bar. I have thought of a gas-powered post-hole digger, but have
>> never used one. For those of you with experience using them, how practical
>> this would be to use to dig 300 holes 10-12 inches deep in sandy loam? Is
>> it likely to be as onerous in its own way as using the planting bar?
>> Anybody have any other ideas for tools to do this?
>>
>> --
>> Richard Robinson
>http://www.nasw.org/users/rrobinson/
>>
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>> Market-farming AT lists.ibiblio.org
>http://lists.ibiblio.org/mailman/listinfo/market-farming
>>
>>
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