Why I Oughta...

How old are our pair of Greenspire Linden trees that are in our yard? I'm NOT sure.  But, I know that we have them in our yard for  (coming up on) six full years - and this will be our seventh growing season.  Planted in the Summer of 2017, the have grown into their own across those six growing seasons.    The last time I showed these trees was in October when they were putting on a fall show with orange and yellow foliage .   This past September, I documented via caliper sizing the overall growth of these trees:  they are both greater than 3" calipers now.  They went from a little bit over 1.5" to more than 3" - doubling in size since 2020.   My plan for this year is to plant underneath these and remove the frames.  But, before I do that, I went out this weekend and began to prune some of the tops of these trees.  That top layer of the espalier is thick and full of new growth.  What kind of growth?  What would appear to be something like a waterspout that sends s

We're now five full growing seasons in with our pair of Greenspire Linden trees  ( Tilia cordata 'Greenspire' ) that we've espaliered into a four-tier horizontal cordon.  Planted in 2017 , I initially went one way with the layout of the branches (at one time, I had six tiers and was even planning on shaping it into a candelabra form ), but last Spring (2020), I finally had a cogent thought (after looking at these trees for years) and made a call to prune A LOT back and go with a simple, four-tiered horizontal cordon.  In the Summer of 2020, I got busy pruning things back and because I was SCARED to really go for it, I ended up leaving a few little branch 'nubs' 1 with some growth on them just to make sure I wasn't pruning off TOO MUCH of the tree at once.  You can go look at this photo here and you'll see the little orange things that I left (at the time).   With all the leaves dropped from these trees, I can start to look at the form they've crea

This post serves as the final 'tree planting' post for the year, but also lays out a little bit of the self-education process I've been through in terms of ornamental tree pruning over the past few weeks. I'm learning (everyday!) that there are many types of pruning - and I've tried one of them:  espalier. But, in addition to espalier, there's also pollarding, pleaching and topping. The espalier I've done includes some horizontal cordon work on a pair of Greenspire Linden trees . After four growing seasons, they're starting to come into their final form and I love them.  And more recently, set up a new pair of crab apple trees with a TBD form .  I've been exploring the other pruning methods to figure out if I should try to learn and get to know them. What I've settled on is trying my hand at pleaching. The first time i talked about pleaching was back in 2018 here when I was discussing trees .  At the time, I was using pleaching and espalier int

Back at the beginning of Summer (or end of Spring), I planted two replacement trees in our Apple tree Belgian Fence to bring the total up to seven - of the needed eight trees.  I used a couple of crabapple trees that are known pollinators for the existing Honeycrisp apple trees.  A couple of weeks ago, I pulled out my pruners   secateurs and some padded wire and cleaned these trees up and wired the limbs in place.  You can see the trees below.   A few notes:   I'm still missing tree #5 (from the left).   I'll likely try to plant something this Fall.   Tree #6 (from the left) is not pruned down far enough.  I was concerned that all the growth was above my cut line, so I decided to leave some on a little higher.  And scored some buds below/near the (ideal) cut line to try to push some new growth.  The other five trees are in growing season #2. I'm now realizing that 18" is too close together.  It will work, but the diamonds won't be as dramatic and I think they wou

When I planted the small Weeping White Spruce in our backyard in 2019 , I noticed at the time that the tree had a sort of dual-leader-thing going on.  I think that's pretty common for young trees that are shipped to retailers:  tree nurseries are likely keeping small trees with ONE STRONG leader in the ground at their nursery because those trees have the strongest likelihood of growing big, tall and straight.  So, we see a lot of trees that have double leaders.  Despite noticing it, I didn't do anything about it.  My habits in terms of tree pruning have changed A LOT in the past four years.   How so?  Well, I was taught by my Dad to limb-up trees.  You want them to grow big and tall, so any energy that they dedicate to the bottom is wasted.  And, I did that.  Making a bunch of immature trees almost lollipop-looking.  And I lost some.    And decided to take a step back and NOT prune trees very much.  This Weeping White Spruce has been the benefactor of that new practice.   I too

Back in 2017, we had a large (3" plus caliper) Chanticleer Pear tree planted in our front yard - adjacent to our garage and driveway.  That tree died in year one and was replaced.  The replacement tree suffered the same way, but it took me close to a year to figure out that the problem was water - but not drought.  It was OVERwatering and the tree was drowning.   I worked the hole and tried to break through the clay bowl, but the tree has never been right. In 2018, it flowered in November .  Weird, right?    I last covered this tree in April of last year when it was showing just a couple of flower buds .  It leaf'd out just a little bit last year and I assumed that it was a goner this Spring. So much so, that I planted another , second tree in the shadow of this one with the thinking that I'd get a half-year head start with the new tree when the time came to chop down this pear.  That tree was this very thin Red Fox Katsura tree that I planted "between two driveways&

It took a little bit over a year , but I now have this folding pruning saw in my yard and garden toolset.  Last March, I shared a photo of a Fiskars folding pruning saw that I saw at Walmart and realized that I could put it to good use. We have plenty of limbs that fall from the trees in our yard that are too big to 'crack' but too small to pile up and process with a more formal saw.  Couple that dynamic with the fact that I don't own a chainsaw and you'll start to understand how I could use this saw. Look at the pile of limbs from that large downed Oak limb in this post for the type of cuts that I'd use this saw for in our yard. Here's a look at the saw below - out of the package: The back of the package includes an interesting nugget in terms of what this saw is applicable for:  wood, plastic and BONE (up to 4").  Bone, people! I haven't been great about keeping all my garden tools in one spot - in a way that makes them easy to tu

We have a front yard Saucer Magnolia tree that was planted in the Summer of 2017 by our landscaper that has been with us since we moved into our new house.  The first time that I posted about this Saucer Magnolia was when I shared a photo of the tree in early August 2017 and talked about how I had 'limb'ed up' the tree to remove some of the lower branching and some newly emerging trunks from the base.   Our tree is multi-trunked (or multi-stemmed and/or multiple trunks) and at the time I was deciding to remove some of the stems/trunks that were shooting out sideways.   By September of 2017, it seemed that the tree had survived the Summer transplant (but...look at the lawn!  yikes!) and was showing plenty of green leaves.  The following February (2018), I did my first Winter check-in on the tree where it was showing off some buds that it had set the previous (first) Fall.  And by May of 2018, the tree put on a show:  flowers .  I didn't include photos of the tree

This is a photo I took from my cab one early morning that shows off some very large street trees in Tokyo that have been heavily pruned.  I've posted about street trees like this before here .  But, if you look closely behind those larger parkway or street trees, you'll see some smaller, very thin conifer trees that have been trained or pruned to be long and leggy in the style of the larger spruce/pine trees that I saw in the Imperial Gardens.  Remember that photo of a beautiful tree that I posted from outside the Peninsula Hotel ?  I think these little trees might be on their way towards something like that one:  a big, strong singular trunk that can be wired to create some of that curvature and longer limbs with needles clustered on their tips.  Scroll down on this post from my last trip to Tokyo where I visited the Imperial Gardens and you can see more of these mature conifer trees. #8 on my 2019 Garden To-Do List is to plant more conifers .  I know I want to look at

I was out at the Walmart with one of the kids on a recent weekend and I naturally wandered into the garden section.  They didn't have the outside part open yet, but the inside was being stocked up for all your Spring and Summer needs.  There were pots of all various shapes and sizes, bags of soil and down at the end of the garden center was this display of tools.  They had pruners and clippers and shovels.  But they also had this:  a folding saw.  (oh...and yeah..there's a blade sharpener, too!  But, for this post, let's focus on the folding saw.) Our yard is full of medium and some very mature trees.  Oaks and Maples.  And they loose a lot of little branches and limbs.  So, every Spring (and frankly...all Summer long), our yard is full of sticks.  Plenty of them are small little things.  I can crack them in two with my hands and I throw them in one of the fireplaces.  But others are larger and I can't handle them well.  I don't own an axe - either a large on