EVERGREENS 



EVERGREENS 



1179 



flexible enough to bend. If not sufficiently flexible and 

 tractable, they are cut off. 



A canvas is made 15 to 24 inches deep, and is made 

 smaller at the bottom by folding over a V and sewing 

 it. This makes it fit a conical ball and, when it is 

 pulled up 3 inches by the cross-lashing at the top, makes 

 it tighter. The canvas has cross-ropes sewed on it with 

 rings at the top and bottom, and on the deeper balls 

 two rows of rings in the middle. The bottom rope is 

 tightened by a wooden lever 20 inches long with four 

 holes, the rope being looped through the holes and the 

 lever thrown over to pull the rope tight. The top rope 

 is then tied and tightened by cross-lashing. 



To get the ball free from the subsoil, dig under all 

 around and tip the tree slightly. Level off the bottom 

 with a fork. If there are tap-roots, tunnel under and 

 cut them with a saw. Put a platform as far under as 

 possible and tip the tree back. To get the ball in the 

 center of the platform, put a hammock around the ball 

 and pull. Hold the platform in position by crowbars 

 driven in front of it. Lash the ball to the platform, 

 make an incline, drag the platform out of the hole onto 

 a truck or sled. Skids 

 with small wheels set in 

 them about 1 foot apart 

 enable a team to load a 

 ball quickly. With balls 

 10 to 15 feet feet in diam- 

 eter and 20 inches deep, 

 jacks and pipe rollers are 

 needed. 



1457. Transporting a large evergreen tree. 



Trees over 10 feet need to be tipped over to go under 

 wires. If the canvas is put on tight and at the proper 

 taper, and if the ball is cut flat to fit close to the plat- 

 form and lashed tight to the platform, the tipping 

 can be done without the ball shaking loose. Sometimes 

 a canvas or burlap bottom can be put between the 

 platform and the ball. In unloading, the tree is stood 

 up, team hooked to the platform and the tree dragged 

 off to the ground. The tree may drop 2 feet without 

 injury. The platforms are dragged to the hole and 

 balls less than 4 feet rolled into the hole. Larger 

 balls have the platform dragged into the hole and the 

 platform pulled out holding the tree in position by a 

 hammock. To straighten the tree, tramp the earth 

 solid under it until it stands erect. Take off the canvas, 

 spread out the side roots, pack the earth and anchor as 

 with deciduous trees. Keep the ball moist; examine 

 it once a month or more often by digging or boring 

 into the ball during the first two years. Evergreens 

 moved with a too small ball or with not enough fibers 

 in the ball or with the watering neglected, may grow 3 

 inches a year for the first two or three years. If prop- 

 erly moved, they will grow 6 inches or more a year 

 half their normal growth. 



Deciduous trees may be moved with balls of earth 

 by the above method, and it has proved an aid with 

 difficult species, as beech, oak, liquidambar, tulip. 

 Especially when previously transplanted or root- 

 pruned, the above trees 3J^ inches in diameter moved 

 with a ball of earth 4 feet in diameter are very success- 



75 



1458. Picea excelsa, the Norway 

 spruce. One of the 'most popu- 

 u* evergreens. 



ful, while without a ball many are lost or the growth is 

 much slower. Investigation should be made to see 

 whether this is because of less disturbance of the 

 roots or because there is carried with the roots and soil 

 a mycelium of a fungus which aids the roots to take 

 up plant-food and mois- 

 ture. 



The tune of year for 

 moving trees is of minor 

 importance. It is over- 

 emphasized by purchaser, 

 landscape architects and 

 nurserymen, and results 

 in heavy financial loss to 

 nurserymen in congesting 

 sales and their own plant- 

 ing in the short spring 

 season. It greatly lessens 

 the total amount of plant- 

 ing needed for forest, 

 shelter - belt, landscape, 

 fruit, and other economic 

 purposes. A nurseryman 

 may plant all the year. 

 Evergreens can be taken 

 up with a ball of earth even in May and June. The 

 new growth may curve down. After June 20, the 

 spruces, and after July 10, the pines, are firm enough 

 not to wilt. August-September sales with a ball of 

 earth are just as successful as April. The ground is 

 warm and the roots grow rapidly; the ground can be 

 made moist. Weather in September is less dry than 

 in May and June. 



Small evergreens up to 2 feet high may be planted 

 in August and September from one part of the nursery 

 to another without balls of earth, if the roots are very 

 carefully dissected out without breaking. There will 

 be more failures if the week following planting is hot 

 and dry. 



Planting with balls of earth 

 may continue all winter, 

 especially if the ground is 

 mulched to keep out the frost 

 and permit economical dig- 

 ging of the tree and the hole. 

 The frozen ball of earth is 

 an old method, frequently 

 referred to, but is not an aid. 

 If the ball is frozen solid and 

 remains so for one or two 

 months with dry winds, the 

 top may dry out and die as 

 has occurred with red cedar. 

 If the ball is not frozen, sap 

 can come up to take the 

 place of that lost by trans- 

 piration. 



A ball of earth 3 

 feet in diameter is 

 needed for an ever- 

 green 8 to 10 feet 

 high ; 4}/6 feet in diam- 

 eter for an evergreen 

 15 feet high, except 

 red cedar which can 

 have a ball 3 feet; a 

 ball of earth 12 feet 

 in diameter is needed 

 for a pine 35 feet high. 

 Root -pruning pines, 

 spruce and hemlock, 

 permits moving the 

 following year with a 

 smaller ball than 

 otherwise. In root- 

 pruning, the trench 





1459. Picturesque field pine. 

 remnant of a forest. 



