Transplanting Fruit and Nut producing trees

Late Fall/Autumn is the idea time to plant/transplant trees, bushes and shrubs.

Select and Plant The Best Fruit and Nut Tree varieties Suited To Your USDA Hardiness Zone. Temperature / Chilling Hours Zone

No matter where you live, now is a good time to plant your fruit and nut trees, whether they be bagged in burlap, potted or bare root. Follow planting guides for planting your fruit and nut trees. Dig a hole 2 times as wide and deep as your trees root ball. Take a little extra care and be sure your new tree is setting straight up and not leaning off to one side.
*Caution: Do Not Plant your new tree too deep! Plant it at the same depth as it was in the field (if bare root) or if potted or bagged, no deeper than the bag or pot it is currently in.

Home gardeners have killed many more trees and shrubs planting them to deep than have ever been killed planting them to shallow. If planted to deep, they may look fine for the first year or two, but, then suddenly with out apparent cause die. In this case you have wasted your money, time and effort on an avoidable problem. Keep the trees crown at or above the soil line when planting!

Winter watering is every bit as important as summer watering. To the eye that new tree is totally dormant needing little care through winter months. That is a very wrong assumption, trees continue to grow and develop their root systems all winter to support new growth appearing in spring and summer.
Apply 3 to 6 inches of mulch around you new trees to help retain moisture and to protect their root from freezing winter weather conditions.

Winter Chilling hour requirements for fruit and nut trees.
In the simplest terms 1 chilling hour is when the temperature is warmer than 32 degrees and cooler than 45 degrees. There are other factors that you should also consider. Fruit trees chilling hour requirements vary greatly between fruit type and even between species of the same fruit / nut tree species.

Some fruit and nut trees may require few (low) chilling hours 150-200 hours to very long chilling hour requirements as much as 1700 or more hours.

If a fruit tree does not get the chilling hours they need, you may have trees that ‘Never’ produce fruit or trees that always bloom too early in spring time and have buds, flowers and fruit severely damaged or killed every year by late season frost and freezing weather. A safe bet is to plant the same type and variety trees you see in your area that reliably produce good fruit crops every year.
Don’t be Shy, ask other gardeners what species and variety does well for them.

Do your homework, select the correct trees for your climate zone. You can’t successfully grow Orange trees in Montana. Planting trees not suited to your USDA Hardiness Zone will only be a disappointed when they fail to produce fruit and are killed by harsh winter cold temperatures.

Why is common sense so uncommon?
Don’t be shy. Leave me your comment(s)