TRANSPLANTING EVERGREENS.Thegeneral impression that evergreens are very difficult to transplant is not well founded if one will observe a few directions.The best time for transplantingis when the tips begin to show fresh growth in spring. This is exactly the reverse of directions in English books, which denounce spring, and enjoin fall transplanting—in the climate of England, doubtless with good reason; and it is a good illustration of the caution necessary before imitating, in our climate, the most skillful foreign practices.A friend informs us that he has always totally lost all his fall transplantings; not saving ten in a hundred; and other men say they have had similar experience, andit is a settled fact that fall transplanting of evergreens is bad practice.The best methodof removing is to lift the plant with as many roots and fibres as possible. More care should be used in this respect than in the removal of fruit-trees; indeed, there is little risk when good roots are obtained and kept in a moist condition. In planting, the most successful operators that we have seen, mix about half and half commonsoil and old rotten wood from the forests, filling it in carefully about the roots and covering the surface with substances which will prevent too much evaporation of moisture, as litter, decayed wood, sods grass side down, etc., etc.The old wood employed should be thoroughly decomposed; and that of the hackberry, maple, and beech are preferred. The decayed wood of the black walnut and oak do not seem congenial to plants.When large trees are to be removed it is often done with success in the winter, by opening a trench about the tree and permitting the ball of earth to freeze pretty thoroughly. The tree is then undermined and upon a sledge easily removed to its destination. The hole for its reception should have been dug while the ground was unfrozen, and it will be necessary to wait until it thaws before it can again be filled in about the tree.
Thegeneral impression that evergreens are very difficult to transplant is not well founded if one will observe a few directions.
The best time for transplantingis when the tips begin to show fresh growth in spring. This is exactly the reverse of directions in English books, which denounce spring, and enjoin fall transplanting—in the climate of England, doubtless with good reason; and it is a good illustration of the caution necessary before imitating, in our climate, the most skillful foreign practices.
A friend informs us that he has always totally lost all his fall transplantings; not saving ten in a hundred; and other men say they have had similar experience, andit is a settled fact that fall transplanting of evergreens is bad practice.
The best methodof removing is to lift the plant with as many roots and fibres as possible. More care should be used in this respect than in the removal of fruit-trees; indeed, there is little risk when good roots are obtained and kept in a moist condition. In planting, the most successful operators that we have seen, mix about half and half commonsoil and old rotten wood from the forests, filling it in carefully about the roots and covering the surface with substances which will prevent too much evaporation of moisture, as litter, decayed wood, sods grass side down, etc., etc.
The old wood employed should be thoroughly decomposed; and that of the hackberry, maple, and beech are preferred. The decayed wood of the black walnut and oak do not seem congenial to plants.
When large trees are to be removed it is often done with success in the winter, by opening a trench about the tree and permitting the ball of earth to freeze pretty thoroughly. The tree is then undermined and upon a sledge easily removed to its destination. The hole for its reception should have been dug while the ground was unfrozen, and it will be necessary to wait until it thaws before it can again be filled in about the tree.