North American Fruit Explorers mailing list at ibiblio

[Richard Moyer <ramoyer@gmail.com>]

Ginda,
For last 13 yrs, been digging up and removing autumn olive, ailanthus,
multiflora rose, privet, etc on our farm.

Rocky parts of our farm, the roots of these healthy plants run over and
around rock, large and small, to get to pockets of deeper soil.
So seems to me you're doing what young seedling trees would be doing from
the start:  sending out feeler roots to find those areas where there's room
to grow...

While on sabbatical in Korea, when wandering around Yonsei campus in Seoul,
I often saw campus landscape crew transplanting large, native forsythia and
weigela.  When shaping these round rootballs into the abundant rock
crevices on campus hillsides; they sure had a different idea of a
"proper planting hole" than I did. Once the weather warmed and we saw these
plants growing wild as we hiked, we realized the landscapers were merely
placing the plants as they grew in the wild.  Korean culture is 5000 yrs
old.  Even at my 60 yrs, I'm content to leave more rocks in place and learn
to work around them!

Grace and peace,
Richard
Eating apple crisp for breakfast:  Liberty, Enterprise and seedling apples
from our farm.

Message: 2
> Date: Mon, 23 Nov 2020 08:19:00 -0500
> From: Ginda Fisher <list@ginda.us>
> To: NAFEX Fruit Explorers <nafex@lists.ibiblio.org>
> Subject: Re: [nafex] Leaves in hole before fruit tree
> Message-ID: <3E439655-C2D2-4AB0-837A-3A70BC48912E@ginda.us>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=utf-8
>
> I?m curious what others think of what I?ve been doing recently. I have
> reasonably nice soil, but it?s full of rock of all different sizes, some
> large. So digging holes is very hard work. And I understand that it?s
> important not to bend the roots of a young plant back on itself. So I?ve
> been digging a small hole for the ?core" of the plant, and spreading out
> the roots on the top of the soil, and then digging a small trench for each
> root, often with a trowel. For instance, I planted some apple rootstock
> that was basically a stick with half a dozen long thread-like roots. So I
> dug a star, and spread out each root thread in a different direction.
>
> It?s a lot less digging. If I hit a large rock, I can guide the root
> around it. I?ve planted tree peonies, apples, and hazelnuts this way.
>
> Nothing that I?ve planted that way has seemed to die of it, yet. (Plants
> that died mostly did so because a deer ate the whole plant. A tree peonies
> developed some fungal disease.)  But I feel a little guilty when I do this.
>
> Wishing you all a safe Thanksgiving,
> Ginda Fisher
> eastern MA, zone 6
>
> > On Nov 23, 2020, at 7:32 AM, Elizabeth Hilborn <ehilborn@mebtel.net>
> wrote:
> >
> > I echo Lee's advice. I never amend holes now, I plant in soil as it lays
> and top dress.
> >
> > My first experience growing fruit trees I amended all (very big) holes.
> They lasted about 12 years, got quite large, but when they started dying, a
> post mortem revealed roots did not penetrate beyond the original hole
> diameter.
> >
> > On 11/23/2020 6:13 AM, Lee Reich wrote:
> >>  And any material that dramatically changes the soil porosity creates a
> ?pot in the ground? effect wherein roots stay inn the amended soil
> >
>
>