Planting Guidelines Part III: Post-Planting Care
A Guideline to Effective Watering
Initial Watering Procedure After Planting
All landscape plants should be thoroughly watered to the point of soil saturation at the time of planting. This provides essential moisture, hydrates the soil and settles the soil in the planting hole.
Deciding and Identifying When it’s Time to Water
Different plants have different water needs. Plants should be grouped according to their requirements and watered accordingly.
When the soil is dry below the surface of the mulch, it is time to water.
The best time to water is at night from 10 pm until 8 am. Trees relieve water deficits (refill) over the night time hours, plus night time watering has less evaporative loss thereby assuring more water moves into the soil and the tree.
The next best time to water is in the late afternoon. At this time the foliage is dry and the evaporation potential is not at it’s peak. This helps minimize pests which require longer wetting periods.
Water trees at least once a week, barring rain, and at least twice a week during hot weather.
Water until mid-fall. Taper off the watering as the temperature lowers. When the soil temperature reaches 40 degrees the roots will quit growing and the plant’s need for water is highly diminished.
During conditions of drought, supplemental watering will greatly assist in maintaining a plant’s health during both the growing and the dormant seasons.
Watering Cautions
Automatic lawn irrigation systems which run 20 to 30 minutes per day often results in a continuously saturated soil condition, especially in clay soils. This will leave to severe root damage and plant death.
Care must be exercised when planting in poorly drained soils.
Soil moisture needs to be monitored for the first few years after planting until the plant is established. Different types of plants establish at different rates.
Signs of Over Watering
Over watering will cause leaves to turn yellow or fall off.
Other Key Post-Planting Considerations
Pruning and Trimming
The only pruning required at planting time is to remove any branches which have been damaged during handling and transplanting. Do not trim the main leader on a singlestemmed tree unless it has been damaged. Lower branches should not be removed as they manufacture critically needed food plus help protect and shade the lower trunk.
Pruning to shape or train a tree to grow in a specific manner should be done only after they become established, which is normally in one to two growing seasons.
Staking and Guying
As discussed earlier the staking of trees is not recommended except in cases of locations having frequent strong winds. In such cases the tree will become unstable in strong winds and will undergo excessive movement or blow over. These excessive movements which can dislodge the small, fibrous roots from their new footing in the soil before they are firmly established.
When staking is necessary we recommend using a two stake system with a wide, flexible tie material which will minimize trunk damage. Staking should not be necessary after the first year, two years at most.
Wrapping the Trunk
Wrapping the trunk of a newly planted tree is not recommended. In most cases wrapping a trunk causes more unintended damage than it does good. Wrapping increases insect, water and disease damage to trunks. Another key issue is that the wrapping covers the photosynthetic tissues of the trunk and thus prevent the production of food which the tree needs to survive.
Like staking, wrapping the trunk requires a compelling reason. If protection from mowers, weed-eaters and other garden implements is the issue, use a tree guard which allows air circulation so moisture doesn’t build up and create other problems.
Mulching
The benefits of mulching are so important that we consider it to be an integral part of the planting process and therefore included it in Planting Guidelines: Part II: Plant Installation Guidelines.
From a post-planting perspective the only consideration is one needs to re-mulch every two years or so when the existing mulch breaks down. Follow the same guidelines as presented previously.
Fertilizing
As presented in Planting Guidelines: Part II: Plant Installation Guidelines, we do not recommend fertilizing plants at the time of planting. Fertilization does however become an important part of post-planting plant care once the plant becomes established.
Due to the plant and site specific nature of fertilization we cannot make general recommendations. Please visit our Garden Center and we will assist you in establishing rates of fertilization as well as types of fertilization for your plants.
This concludes Planting Guidelines: Part III: Post-Planting Guidelines which is the final part of our three part series on how to select, plant and care for your plants. We at Country Arbors Nursery hope you find the series useful in the selection, growth and maintenance of your landscape plants.
If you have recommendations or suggestions as to how we can better improve our methods more effectively communicate with our valued customer please contact us.
Planting Guidelines Part III: Post-Planting Guidelines - Last Update: 09.01.03-6
