Whether planting in fall or spring, you’ll want your new trees to survive frost, heat, and drought. Most species are incredibly resilient once they establish themselves—the key is helping them establish themselves before stressors hurt them.
Taking plants from one setting and putting them in another can be traumatic. They have to face new soil, sun conditions, and water frequencies. Reduce the stressors’ impacts on your transplants, and they’ll take off readily with fresh growth.
Some easy ways to help tender trees are maintaining soil moisture, pruning excess top growth, and protecting them from the elements. Close monitoring ensures you catch issues before they grow into problems. Watch for premature leaf drop, yellow leaves, and softening wood.
Let’s dive deep below the soil to give your trees their necessary care! We’ll learn how to best care for transplants through nine easy tips.
Soil Testing Kit
Our soil testing kit provides not only a comprehensive suite of test results, but it breaks them down for you in plain English so you don’t have to be a soil scientist to understand the results and make positive change in your soil quality.
Protect With Frost Cloth
Fall transplants have to brave freezing weather, ice, and frigid winds. Some species are frost-tender, while others survive below-freezing temperatures! Select native trees for the best cold hardiness, as they evolve to grow in your local zone. They often need less fertilizer, water, and care than their non-native ornamental counterparts.
If you’re trying out eucalyptus in zone eight, or a flowering cherry below zone five, you may want to protect them from occasional temperature drops below their preferred range. Frost cloth is a cheap material that does the job well. Old bedsheets are excellent substitutes if you don’t have cloth available. They trap warm air around the tree, keeping top growth and the roots safe amidst ice storms.
Simply drape the cloth or bed sheet over your trees, bunching it at their base. Weigh down the ends with rocks so they don’t flap in the wind. Take the frost cloth off during the day as the weather warms to let your trees access sunlight and fresh air. The thin fabric traps air around the tree and maintains a warmer ambient temperature than air outside, but it prevents sunlight from reaching inside.
Soak The Ground
Watering basins function at their peak when they accompany good irrigation techniques. A good rule of thumb is to water a lot every few days, rather than a little daily. Light sprinklings encourage shallow roots from all plants, making them less resilient to drought, freeze, and pests.
An easy way to soak the ground is to let your hose trickle on low for 30 minutes to an hour inside the watering basin. A low trickle allows the moisture to seep into all parts of the ground, guiding your tree to grow healthy roots in all directions.
I soak fruit trees once or twice a month during the growing season in the Pacific Northwest, and deciduous ornamental ones less so. New transplants might need as much as one to three deep soakings a week while actively growing. You’ll want to water as often as necessary to ensure consistent moisture around their roots. This may be more often in the summer and less during fall, winter, or spring.
The season you transplant your tree also affects its adaptability, as certain climates have rainy or dry weather depending on the time of year. When planting during fall, water trees so they are moist but not soggy. You may not have to water much if you experience lots of natural rainfall from autumn through winter. Evergreen trees drink more water during cold seasons than deciduous ones, and their soil dries quickly when thirsty.
Adjust your irrigation schedule to match their preferences so they don’t get too much or too little. Spring plantings need more water than fall ones, especially in climate zones with warm, dry growing seasons. Plants sprout new growth in bunches, and they suck up water as they do this. Keep transplants’ soils moist but not soggy, watering when the top inch or two of soil dries.
Apply Plenty Of Mulch
Freshly planted trees benefit from a boon of organic matter in their soil. Mulches like compost, leaf mold, and straw act as moisture, temperature, and air regulators. When summer heat threatens to dry out dirt, mulch acts like a skin for the soil. It traps moisture for ample root growth amidst heat waves.
During winter freeze, mulch coatings keep soils warm and moist. They hold on to water reserves below the snow cover for perennials, trees, and shrubs. Compost, unlike clay soil, has lots of air pockets in it. This extra air helps tree roots breathe no matter how harsh the aboveground weather is.
The best mulch is compost—it injects mycorrhizae, bacteria, and worms into soils. This healthy activity boosts trees’ performance by giving them more nutrients, water, and air pockets than dead soils would. Apply a thick layer of the stuff after transplanting, and continue applying it every spring and fall as long as your tree lives.
Prune Sparingly
Pruning may seem complicated, but it’s an excellent way to regulate fresh transplants so they adapt to their new homes. You’ll want to prune differently depending on the season. Fall transplanting is ideal for most trees in mild winter zones, while spring plantings are regular below USDA plant hardiness zone five.
For fall transplants, cut off any dead or diseased wood. If you pruned the roots during transplanting, prune off an equal amount of top growth. When you remove roots, you take away feeders that correspond with branches above the soil. Match their sizes, and your tree will sprout with new growth as warm temperatures arrive.
Spring transplants may already be growing as you put them in the ground. Prune any dead or diseased wood, and match their root size with their top size. Avoid pruning for shape until the next year to let your trees adapt to their new conditions. Excessive pruning shocks young plants, and sets them back considerably.
Add Organic Fertilizer
Fall plantings won’t need fertilizer until spring, as it’ll cause excessive top growth that is more frost-tender than usual. Spring plantings may need a boost when you transplant them. Apply a low dose of organic fertilizer around the root zone and water it into the soil as new leafy growth occurs.
Most native soils have ample nutrients and microbial activity for trees to succeed. If your specimens exhibit yellowing leaves, leaf drop, or weak growth from spring through summer, they may need a fertilizer boost. Apply a regular dose of organic fertilizer weekly until nutritional deficiencies disappear.
An easy way to know exactly which nutrients your dirt needs is with a soil testing kit. It’ll tell you nutrient deficiencies, organic matter content, and pH levels so you can adjust them as you see fit. As autumn approaches, you’ll want to stop fertilizing altogether. Wait until new growth appears in spring to resume your soil-boosting regimen.
Put Up Shade Cloth
Summer heat invites sun scald, pests, and moisture issues for young saplings. They struggle to use their sensitive short roots to suck up water, which sets them back on their transplanting journey. Shade cloth is a simple and effective material to protect your newly planted trees from excessive direct sunlight.
Get started by tying up rope or cables above the tree’s canopy. Then, drape the shade cloth over the rope so it leaves some room between the cloth and the leaves. Leave shade cloth on during hot days over 95°F (35°C), and remove it when temperatures lower to a normal range.
Some zones have mild summers with minimal heat waves, making shade cloth an unnecessary tool. It’s helpful for growers living in zones eight or above where temperatures regularly exceed 90°F (32°C).
Monitor For Pests And Diseases
Weak plants are prime targets for pests and diseases. They’re always on the prowl for susceptible specimens they can infect and multiply on. Young saplings are especially vulnerable as they lack the thick root growth they need to bolster their defenses. Watch for aphids, leaf-eating beetles, and leaf miners.
Spray your trees daily with strong jets of water if you suspect pests. The consistent moisture prevents them from establishing themselves, and they’ll find a weaker target to invade. Diseases are different, as they all have unique treatments.
Bolster saplings’ defenses with a thick layer of compost. It’ll speed up root growth, keep bad bugs away, and boost disease resistance. Most trees are strong and hardy after their first year of growth and require less and less care as they age. Give them a little extra love while they’re young, and they’ll grow above you for decades.
