A Prairie Garden Journal    by Dick Meyer

Homegrown Economic Stimulus

Plant a Tree
in
2009

"The best time to plant a tree is 20 years ago... the second best time is now"

“The best time to plant a tree is 20 years ago, the second best time is now”—so goes the old saying about the best time to plant a tree.   Well, it turns out that 2009 may actually be as good a time to plant a tree as 20 years ago—and for a few reasons that may just surprise you. 

You probably already know all of the “green” reasons to plant a tree.   When planted in the right location trees can significantly reduce winter heating and summer cooling costs—lowering your utility bills (which is especially good right now), and significantly reducing your contribution to the build up of carbon in the earth’s atmosphere—which may or may not be contributing to global climate change.   Most people still don’t realize that over half of all of the extra carbon going into the earth’s atmosphere is the result of human activities related to buildings—not cars.  When planted in the right locations, trees reduce the amount of carbon going into the atmosphere in order to heat and cool your home and, regardless of where they are planted, trees pull fairly large amounts of carbon back out of the atmosphere as they grow and tie it up in their tissues.  
But in 2009, there are also good economic reasons to plant a tree.  That’s right, planting a tree is a good thing to do in our present recession.  Ask any economist—in a recession you want to spend money now (to stimulate the economy) on things that save you money in the future (when you are going to need to pay back the money that your government is spending now). 

Planting a tree improves our economic infrastructure by reducing the economy’s future energy costs and planting a tree in 2009 will certainly stimulate the economy of your favorite garden center.  Or to put it another way—planting a tree is a “shovel ready” project. 

There’s one good old-fashioned reason to plant a tree in 2009—it’s likely to cost you quite a bit less that it would have last year.   You may not think of the trees for sale in your local garden center as a farm crop, but in many respects they are.  The prolonged housing construction boom in the United States over the past 20 or so years created a big demand for young trees to plant in all of those new yards.  Nurseries around the country have had a hard time keeping up with the increased demand—but they did by increasing production.  Well, the demand for trees in new home landscapes has declined rather sharply over the past year, so there are a lot of trees on the market.  As a result, the prices are coming down—and will likely stay down for a year or so while the excess supply works its way through the supply chain.  In other words 2009 will be a really good year to plant a tree, or several trees, in your home landscape.

Previous Articles

Yes It's Time March 12

Pruning Trees March 26

2008 Articles

2007 Articles

2006 Articles
 

Planting a tree isn’t hard.  Here’s a simple “plant by the numbers” approach.

1.     1. Prepare a 6’ diameter,  or better yet an 8’ diameter,  planting site for your tree by:

a.    Removing the sod

b.    Spreading 1-2 inches of compost and 4-5# of sulfur over the entire site

c.    Loosely spading the entire site (don’t worry about breaking up the clods)

2.     2. Dig a hole in the center of your planting site about twice as wide as the root ball of your new tree and about 2-3 inches shallower than the depth of the root ball of your new tree.  As a general rule, trees should be planted so that the top of their root ball is 2-3 inches higher than the surrounding ground level.

3.     3. Remove the tree from its container and take 3-5 minutes to work the roots out of the tight circles that they were forced to grow into in the container.  If you damage any roots, simply prune off the damage roots with a sharp pruner.  Some experts recommend washing the potting soil off the roots of a container tree before planting.  That method also works well.  Don’t worry, exposing roots to air and sunlight for the time it takes to plant a tree won’t hurt them at all.

4.    4. Set the tree in the planting hole and loosely place the soil back around the roots.  Do not tamp the soil with your feet.  Simply place a slow running hose in the hole and let the water settle the soil around the roots as it fills up the hole.   Watering in or “mudding in” your tree will take 10 to 15 minutes .  If it’s windy, you may need to hold the tree upright while watering it in.  After the water settles away, you’ll be surprised at how firmly planted the tree will feel.

5.    5. When you are finished watering in your tree, and the water has settled away, smooth out the planting site with a rake.  The site should have a slight crown—rising up to the trunk of the tree—but there should be no extra dirt  on top of the root ball. 

6.    6. Mulch the entire site with 3-4 inches of shredded wood mulch.

7.    7. Stake the tree only if necessary (and it often isn’t necessary).

          Illustrated info on tree planting

         After you plant your tree register it at Re-Tree Nebraska