Tree Planting

It's getting that time of year, to order seedlings and prepare for tree planting. These photos were taken 6-8 years ago.
The single best thing I ever did was plant Autumn Olives several rows thick around my property line. Now they are considered an invasive plant, however they have not spread on my place. They grow extremely fast, provide a great cover and a dense screen. You can see (barely) High Bush Cranberry to the left next to the lane and they are barely a few feet high and planted the same time as the Olives! These Autumn Olives were 3 years old when the picture was taken.

Planting trees with a County Conservation Board planter




Sod killed with Roundup in September to prepare for spring planting of trees on CRP ground.



Tree planting using Oust and Princep herbicides to control weeds.



If your thinking about planting trees and shrubs for wildlife food, cover or a "poacher screen" check out:

Iowa Tree Planting
Coldstream Farm
Oikos Tree Crops
Windbreak Trees/Kelly Tree Farm
MDC- Nursery
Idaho University Nursery
Red Fern Farm Nursery
Windbreak Trees/Kelly Tree Farm
Lincoln Oakes Nursery
The Wildlife Group
Reeseville Ridge Nursery
Edward Fort Nurseries
Rhora's Nut Farm and Nursery
PA Game Comission - Howard Nursery
St. Lawrence Nursery
North Central Reforestation
Lawyer Nursery
Native Nurseries
Big Rock Trees
Woody Warehouse
Advantage Forestry
Porky Farm Nursery
Nuserymen

Lot's of great information and ideas to create better habitat and protect those big bucks!

Planting information:

Iowa State Forest Nursery Seedling Catalog

How to plant a tree

Forestry links

Tree planting objectives and the seedling selection process

Tree seedling availability, planting, and initial care

Early protection and care for planted seedlings

Tree Planting

Tree Planting - Establishment and care

North Dakota Tree Handbook

Here is a list of potential trees one might consider in a hardwood tree planting.

Tree Identification key

Black Oak

Black Oak- Quercus velutina

Northern red oak (Quercus rubra)

Red Oaks

Pin Oak (Quercus palustris)

Pin Oaks

chinkapin oak
Chinquapin Oak (Quercus muehlenbergii)



Dwarf Chinkapin Oak can produce acorns in 3-4 years which makes it very a very attractive oak to consider planting! They are also perhaps the sweetest acorns to be found...

Dwarf Chinkapin Oak seedling sources:
Dwarf Chinkapin Oak — Quercus prinoides Seedling Source

Dwarf Chestnut Oak (Quercus prinoides) does say this...

ALLEGHENY CHINKAPIN

MDC White Oak list

Dwarf Chinkapin Oak (Quercus prinoides) leaves



From this site: dwarf chinkapin oak














Oikos Tree Crops - Dwarf Chinkapin Oak

Morse Nursery - Dwarf Chinkapin Source

LINCOLN-OAKES NURSERIES

Current Nebraska Champion Tree - Oak, Dwarf Chinkapin



Oak ID Key

True Nature Farm - Dwarf Chinkapin Oak seedlings

RPM Southern Hardwoods

The following pics are of Chinkapin oak Quercus muehlenbergii Engelm. (not dwarf)...pretty tough to tell which is which.

Chinkapin oak

swamp white oak Fagaceae Quercus bicolor

Swamp White Oak

White Oak (Quercus alba)

white oak Fagaceae Quercus alba L.

Sawtooth Oak (Quercus acutissima)

sawtooth oak Fagaceae Quercus acutissima Carruthers




A Concordia Oak is a 3-way cross between a swamp white oak, chinkapin oak and dwarf chinkapin oak.

There is some confusion between another "concordia oak" as mentioned here...

Tree tubes

Plantra Tree Tubes




Tubex Tree Shelters




BlueX shelters




TreePro tree shelters



Tree Shelter Tests

Cost Share Options

I'll try to put some of these in the appropriate threads but here are just a few cost share options to consider for various forest improvement practices. Be certain to read the EQIP practice link carefully and note that simple wording can double a payment per acre!!

Iowa only....REAP Practices must be approved by IDNR Forester and paid once inspected by the IDNR Forester and bill submitted.

TSI - Timber Stand Improvement 5 acre minimum - allowed $160 an acre X 75% =$120

Tree Planting - 3 acre minimum $600 allowed per acre X 75% = $450

Tree Planting/Weed Tree Removal - $160/$600 x 75% (weed tree removal may be less acres then total planted)

Federal Programs...these two have identical practices but EQIP practices allowed are different by county/state while WHIP is nationwide.

Environmental Quality Incentives Program (EQIP)
Wildlife Habitat Incentive Program (WHIP)
Check by State

The following is just a brief list of a few of the options available...check this link for the complete list and the payment rates.

2011 Iowa EQIP Practices and Payments

314 Brush Management (weed tree removal)

647 Early Successional Habitat Development/Management (Timber Edge Feathering)

490 Forest Site Preparation

666 Forest Stand Improvement (TSI or Weed Tree removal)

422 Hedgerow Planting

338 Prescribed Burning

391 Riparian Forest Buffer

612 Tree and Shrub Establishment

380 Windbreak or Shelterbelt Establishment

In all cases either the forester or NRCS Tech will need to inspect the finished practice before the operator/landowner can be paid. Usually a simple bill will suffice (10 acres TSI X $160 for example) but in some cases they will want an itemized (seedlings, herbicides, fuel, labor etc) that add up to the total cost share.

The federal programs are not cost share, just a payment per acre so slightly different then the state programs.

Talk with NRCS and your local forester/private land biologist for more details but even they get confused, so look over the links and be informed yourself!
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Re: Tree Planting - Herbicides for weed control

Princep works as a residual more like Atrazine and on my ground, which is very heavy clay, I have to put on a min. of 4 qts to the acre to even make a dent and it works better on bare ground. I don't think you can put Princep on heavy enough to kill year old seedlings.

The Oust is the very best IMO, but it is expensive and potent enough to cause injury to some newly planted seedlings, but safe for conifers and oak seedlings.

Surflan A.S. and Princep is a great combination and perhaps safer to new shrub seedlings.

For smaller plantings I use Roundup and Princep. I use a 2x2 screwed to an upside down 5 gal. bucket and a back pack sprayer(after the seedlings are planted) and set the bucket over each seedling, spray...move on to the next one.

Most evergreens, one can spray Roundup over top of the trees as long as they are not actively growing (producing new growth)which of course can be tricky...

Fall is best for that cause you need the grass growing but the trees not!

To answer your ?? directly , I think you need to at least double the application rate of Princep.

Oust is about $5.50 an oz and Townsend Chemical will sell you however much you need.

Depending on type of trees 2-4 oz per acre.(varies for evergrees and hardwoods)

Townsend Chemical Division

Here's some links to Oust herbicide.

Oust Extra

2007 North Dakota Weed Control Guide

Effective Herbicide Use in Christmas Tree Plantations

IDNR Weed control guide

Weed control in tree plantings

Tree herbicides

Calibrating backpack and ATV sprayers


The first 2-3 years are when seedlings need some help with weed competition but after that mine are on their own.

Here is a list of common tree herbicdes from this link: Weed Control in Tree Plantings

Grass and Weed Control in Tree Plantings


Prior to Weed Emergence

Gallery® specialty herbicide

Gallery 75 Label

Goal® 2XL Herbicide

Pendulum® 3.3 EC Herbicide

Princep® Liquid

Snapshot® 2.5 TG Specialty Herbicide

Trifluralin HF

Oust XP

Surflan A.S. herbicide


Surflan A.S.

Postemergence

Fusilade® II Turf & Ornamental

Sethoxydim E-Pro Herbicide (like Poast)

Select Herbicide

 

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Quote:</div><div class="ubbcode-body">What type of trees/shrubs are there that are similiar to the Autumn olives. Are any available from the state nursery? </div></div>

Check out the State Nursery Shrub list. Nannyberry is one that may do well compared to Autumn Olives. I've tried several native shrubs and they either didn't do well or died all together, so you can see why I preferred the Olives. It figures that invasives do well and natives struggle... /forum/images/%%GRAEMLIN_URL%%/crazy.gif

Here's a link to the IDNR Nursery Catalog and order form:

Iowa State Forest Nursery

Here is a list of native shrubs and information on each that maight make it easier to better understand each one and how it might benefit your own managment program:

Black Chokeberry Aronia melanocarpa

"Nero" Black Chokeberry





Serviceberry (Amelanchier spp.)

Serviceberry



Buttonbush - Cephalanthus occidentalis





Silky Dogwood (Cornus amomum)

Silky Dogwood





Gray dogwood - Cornus racemosa Lam.

Gray Dogwood



Chokecherry

Choke cherry - Prunus virginiana







SANDBAR WILLOW - Salix exigua

Sandbar Willow







Common Elderberry (Sambucus canadensis)

Elderberry

Elderberry, American, Black, or Common






Southern Arrowwood
Southern Arrowwood - Viburnum recognitum








nannyberry - Viburnum lentago L.

NANNYBERRY VIBURNUM









HIGHBUSH CRANBERRY (Viburnum trilobum)

HIGHBUSH CRANBERRY







Red Osier Dogwood - Cornus sericea

REDOSIER DOGWOOD







HAZELNUT (Corylus americana)

American hazel









Common Ninebark, Eastern Ninebark

common ninebark - Physocarpus opulifolius











WILD PLUM (Prunus americana)

American plum; Wild plum













NANKING CHERRY Prunus tomentosa

Nanking cherry

 

Re: Tree Planting - Windbreak/Shelterbelt

The Highbush Cranberries seem to do well but they just don't make a dense enough screen in the fall when I need it most.

I'm working on giving Silky Dogwood, Wild Plum, Hazelnut and others a try. It's unfortunate that the Autumn Olives can be invasive because they are near perfect in every other respect.

They make a complete screen within 3-4 years, last virtually forever and produce berries birds love. So what other alternatives do we have? What will so the trick here in Iowa?

WindbreakTrees.com has a great list of potential trees and shrubs for windbreaks and shelterbelts. Done properly they will provide a great poacher screen, wildlife cover and windbreak.

Conifers are the ultimate to do everything we require from a "poacher screen" except they don't have the fast growth rates.


This is why we include a mix of shrubs, trees and conifers and the ultimate conifer her in Iowa is the red cedar. Deer rarely bother it either by eating it or rubbing itin the fall. It's only drawback is fairly slow growth.





Red Cedars

My second choice is Norway Spruce but hormone charged bucks have killed literally thousands of them on my place. What they haven't killed they have kept stunted, so if you plant them you will need to fence them. Trust me...they LOVE to rub the bristly branches and will DESTROY them!!



They also get extremely tall in time so just allow for this if planting near power lines.

White Spruce form a denser screen more like Red Cedar and are a little slower growing then Norways. Again, fence them or you will regret it!





White Spruce

White Pines are beautiful but they have some serious drawbacks as deer will both eat them and rub them. They get very tall in time and as they do they begin to lose their bottom branches and with that, the ability to screen.

Turkeys love to roost in them and they have a place in tree plantings but the require a great deal of protection for a long long time compared to Red Cedar needing none.






White Pine

There are many possibles including Techny Arborvitae which also can provide a great screen and a palatable winter food source for deer.

Seedlings might be pricer then conventional conifers but effective just the same.





Techny Arborvitae

I have very high deer densities and I have tried many different tree/shrub species and so I can say for a fact that of the conifers, Red Cedar out performs all others will little care compared to other conifers.

That brings us back to shrubs which have been covered previously in this thread.

The American Plum is potential screen canidate but be aware that it too can sucker and spread.(what makes it ok and Autumn Olive not?? )





American Plum (Prunus Americana)

I like Silky Dogwood because it can take a little more "thrashing" and survive. Better for wet areas also.





Silky Dogwood (Cornus Amomum)

Nannyberry is one that does form a fairly dense screen and can be difficult to see through after leaf drop.
I have some growing but they are still small.





Nannyberry (Viburnum lentago)

My hazelnuts are also small but they appear to have some screening possibles. I can tell you they are a pain to plant with HUGE root systems!!





Hazelnut --- American Filbert---(Corylus Americana)

I enjoy trying different trees and shrubs that are good for wildlife, screen my property and leave a lasting legacy. It's fun to see them grow but dissapointing when the fail.

I've had a lot of failures but I keep ate it and find out what works and what doesn't.

 

Silvertip- I have no experience with Autum olive but I have planted nanking cherry, wild plum, and redosier dogwood, all of which are available from the IDNR nursery.
The Cherry and Plum were planted in old pasture and have done ok, but not great. In the areas that I have really concentrated on eliminating competition they have grown to about 3'-5' but in other areas they are 2'-3' after 3 years. My dogwoods are 2 years old and were planted in a cropfield. Everything I planted in cropground has done better, presuably due to the looser soils. After 2 years the dogwoods went from a 2' whip to nice 3'-4' shrubs and fairly thick. The deer browse them heavily but they seem to bounce back fine. A local nursery guy said that deer browse on dogwoods was fine as it acts as a natural pruning to encourage the plant to thicken up. I'm not sure my dogwoods would make a good poacher screen but I wouldnt want to try to thread a bullet through them either, though they need to get taller. Out of 100 dogwoods planted I think virtually every one survived, which I cant say for the others. Of the three, I like the dogwoods the best, JMO.

As for weed/grass control, this year I am switching to a 3pt bushhog which should allow me to get a little closer to the trees vs the pull-behind mower with wheels outside the deck. Hopefully that will help cut down on the competition I have to spray.
Regardless of what you plant, if your going to go to all the effort I strongly recommend you fence them somehow if you have many deer. You can baby a tree all year(s) long only to have it wiped out in one night otherwise. Shrubs do seem to be more tolerant of deer damage than trees though.

 

We planted them anywhere from 2-4 ft. apart in rows 8 ft apart. The closer spacing ended up becoming a thicker screen then where we spread them out. As TP mentioned mowing is a big help the first year or two, so consider the row spacing it you have a small tractor and brush hog that would allow you to mow in between rows.

I would say the Autumn Olives are tough enough to stand everything from bucks thrashing them in the fall, to rabbits eating all the bark off and even severe sub-zero weather...they will just resprout and take right off again, to bad they are considered invasive now.

Look closely at the bottom picture, above and you can kind of see how we spaced them...it's not an exact science with a tree planter /forum/images/%%GRAEMLIN_URL%%/grin.gif

Autumn Olives and Highbush Cranberry at 4 years old. For comparison as far as a screen.

4 Yr Highbush Cranberry...follow down the row and you can get a pretty good idea that it isn't "screening" much!



4 yr old Autumn Olives planted same day, same herbicides as the High Bush Cranberry


I'm going to try several more types including Nannyberry, hazelnut, redosier dogwood and Ninebark to see if any other varieties will produce a suitable screen in...my lifetime!! /forum/images/%%GRAEMLIN_URL%%/wink.gif

I'm going to keep working on filling in with Red Cedars as well, both with seedlings and transplanting wild ones sprouting up in the CRP.

Here's a few pics of spacing comparisons for Autumn Olives. They will fill in quite aways and even without leaves they make a pretty dense screen, although you can see the advantage of red cedars for a "no fail" poacher screen.



This one shows that very close spacings don't really make for a denser screen. Planting two rows and alternating spacings is a better and more cost efficient way to go.



This is a comparison of Autumn Olives and Highbush Cranberry at 8 yrs.



These are 8 yr old Sawtooth Oaks which have grown very quickly. They should start producing acorns very soon. They are considered an invasive, mostly in southern states, but I can't imagine them being more invasive then Shingle Oak! /forum/images/%%GRAEMLIN_URL%%/smirk.gif



I have planted a number of hybrid oaks form Okios Tree Crops. They are most likely a better bet since they are all native oaks, which do "crossbreed" in the wild, hence the fast growing hybrids. They aren't cheap but I try to plant a few every year.

Hybrid oaks

 

Great idea, I imagine one could get plenty of cardboard at supermarkets just for asking.
Here's a commercial version and staples to hold the tree mats down. For oaks, fruit trees and even evergreens I think they would work great...no spraying needed!

VisPore® Tree Mats


Quote:
Wouldn't harmful heat be an issue with the black color? I would think a Summer sun would just cook the tree.

If not, you could just buy a roll of heavy mil plastic at a building center.




Next time your tooling on up 218 towards IC, ck out the tree plantings on the west side Ghost. They are using basically what your talking about. I haven't watched it being done but I think they apply the weed barrier as they plant.

Check out this link for comparisons of all types of weed control from mowing, weed barriers and Oust herbicide. The black plastic apparantly helps the ground warm up faster, helps preserve moisture and get's the tree growing quicker. The study was done in Kansas so I guess if they didn't cook there were safe using it in Iowa!

SYNTHETIC WEED BARRIER

Here's a roll form of weed barrier:

WeedBlock Landscape Fabrics

compared to Oust Herbicide

Oust® XP Herbicide

One caution here is that mice sometimes burrow under the carpet and girdle trees, so use care to keep a center hole large enough to stay away from the bark.

Painting or using a plastic type tree protector can also prevent girdling.

 

Old carpet does work for this also. We had used a light colored carpet which also makes small seedlings like oaks really easy to see.

 

I have used the stinger on my 12,000 loblollys with good sucess.I still have 2 quarts and I think it cost me 125.00 a quart.I have a 3 point sprayer now with a 10 ft boom and plan on planting pines in the spring if all works out?
trust me the stinger is a good product and even kills canadian thistle which I had a problem with.
doug

 

I've also had problems with mice girdling trees which were otherwise protected (caged) from deer and did not have carpet or other mulch around them. You can keep the mice out with tree wrap or, a trick I learned from an apple orchard was to just paint the trucks with flat white paint up about 18" or so. This also seemed to work and was faster to apply than tree wrap (and cheaper since I just used leftover paint I already had around the house). I don't know if it is fool proof but it worked for me

 

My trees from the Iowa DNR State Nursery arrived today. I bought the 200 tree Specialty Package which in my case was 50 Red Cedar, 50 Redosier Dogwood (supposed to be Silky Dogwood ) 50 Nanny Berry and 50 hazelnut.

The seedlings came packed well in plastic bags inside paper bags. They were very large seedlings 18" to 24" however I was not impressed to see the roots were nearly dry! The surest way to kill new seedlings is to let the roots dry out before planting!! It only takes a few minutes on a day like today when a warm dry wind can dry out the roots in moments. I always use a bucket of water to carry seedlings if they are larger or a "planting bag" for smaller seedlings.

When I returned home I had a box of 300 seedlings from Coldstream Farms which were all packed in a sphagnum type moss which keeps the roots moist until planting. I guess time will tell how well the IDNR seedlings survive.

Since I was unable to plant the rest of the seedlings, I "heeled" them in for now, meaning I just planted the bunches temporarily in a shaded spot and packed them tightly with soil until I can plant them.

The seedlings from the IDNR had massive root systems so we used shovels rather then a planting bar and had to carefully push the roots deep with our fingers and then stomp the opening tightly. Air to the root system is an enemy of new seedlings.

Smaller seedlings are much easier to plant with a planting bar.
I planted all the shrub seedlings 3-4 ft apart in rows 6-8 ft apart along a low area exposed to the road. The soil is to wet for the Red Cedar so I planted them on higher ground, also for "poacher screens"

 

I have 100 red cedar coming on Friday, if Buck10 gets them picked up with his order. I havent had too much trouble with dry roots from IDNR, but I always pour water into the bag as soon as I open it. Then I take out 15-20 and put them in a bucket with water, go plant 'em, come back for more, and so on. Dry roots kill 'em quick for sure.

 

That's good to know because hazelnut is one of the few I have never tried before. I'll watch it and see if it takes off this year or not.

 

We finished planting another 350 trees/shrubs today. All the red cedars I planted to fill in where the deer have killed the Norway Spruce


The hazlenuts were a real pain to plant, they had a root system like an umbrella! We had to dig holes big enough to get the roots in rather then using our dibble bars for normal sized seedlings. Hope the darn things live.

 

I'll have to partly disagree with some of the thoughts on not planting the pines and spruces in favor of the red cedars due to the deer eating up the pines and spruces. That is the very reason to start with them. The part that I do agree with is to perhaps is to use the red cedars for filling the voids. Good cover is one thing but something that provides both cover and a preferred food source is even better.

 

I wouldnt mind the deer taking a bite of my pines here and there but when they end up lookin like the picture below they amount to a really inefficent food plot. The deer dont bother my spruces nearly as much. They hardly bother my cedars at all. I expect that when the pines outgrow their cages in 5-10 years they will survive but be stripped on the lower 4' or 5'. They wont supply any food then and will have decreased value as cover. I really like pines, I just dont see how anybody grows them unprotected around any kind of a deer population? For a food / cover combo I would go with corn.

 

Those pines look great 150. I hope mine look that nice in 15-20 years. What kind are they? They look like Scotch or Austrian maybe?
The trees I have trouble with are whites and reds, I think I should have went with a different species. My deer density is actually fairly low and there is no shortage of food. I walked that field to the left of my pic this spring and found plenty of whole ears of corn lying there untouched. They seem to just like the pines as a treat. This spring I planted 2 foodplots in that corn field, I'll have to wait to see if that helps or hurts by just bringing in more (which is the whole idea I suppose).

Dbltree, do you know the name of that disease, and where it is currently at? There are virtually no wild pines around here, just a few ornamentals here and there.

BTW, a guy from my county conservation board was out a week or so ago to see what he would be planting for me (CRP). He said they have given up on the pines due to the damage also and have switched to only cedars.

 

Here's a link to some disease info. I have seen this one but not yet in my pines...hoping it takes awhile.

White Pine root disease

Couple others to watch for...

White Pine Blister Rust

White Pine Weevil

So far as I know right now there are no serious disease problems facing red cedars, so keep this in mind when planning your plantings. Pretty discouraging to wait 10 years to have a screen only to have the trees start dying...

Some interesting info about planting in and "overstory"...

Success with white pine: planting under an overstory

 

Geesh! And I thought all I had to worry about were the deer. On the upside, not all of those were fatal or neccesarily all that detrimental to a wildlife planting. Still, I could do fine without them.
Thanks for the links DT, interesting reading.

 

No matter what one plants...anything along the fencline/road border will certainly make it much harder for poachers

These pics are standing in the road...looking at my "poacher screen" or across the road. Let's see...if I was a deer which side would I feel safe?