Ron Patterson: I'm Ron Patterson with Utah University Extension in Carbon county.
About three and a half years ago, I planted these peach trees and had six
trees left over. I didn't know exactly where to put 'em, so I planted them with
the intent of moving them somewhere and about three years later, I finally got
around to putting them someplace else.
So this spring, with these three year old trees, I got them transplanted and had a
100% success rate. Right here, I have one of these transplanted trees.
It actually even produced fruit this year. And then you can see behind me on this
other side--that's what the original tree would have looked like, so it does shock
'em down a little bit, but if you need to move a tree that's not too large, you can
do it by hand. So this video will show you how to do that.
When you plant a tree, normally you want to make sure--well, always you want to
make sure you're planting it where you want it, but sometimes you find out that
you just planted it in the wrong place. These peach trees that I've got here, I've
got some of them that I just planted and I've just decided that they're not where I
want them to be, and so I'm going to transplant them.
They've been here about four years, so the chance of success is somewhat limited, but
if you follow some of these basic rules, your trees will have a better opportunity
to be successful if you follow these basic rules that I'm going to talk about today.
Now, some of the tools that you will need are--you'll need to have some pruning
tools like the loppers, a pruning handsaw, and some hand pruners because when it
all boils down to it, you want to have balance between the roots and the top.
And you're going to cut out a lot of the roots, especially if they've been here for
as long as four years.
If I were to wait any longer, I probably wouldn't dare to do this, but I think that
I can be successful if I'm very careful. But I want to make sure that the top is
going to be balanced with what's left of the roots.
Another tool that will be handy to have is a trenching spade. They're very nice, very
handy. They're good and narrow and you can get down deep with your blade.
That's a good tool to have for this particular job.
And then when you're ready to move the tree, you'll want to have a tarp to wrap
your root ball in to keep it from falling apart when you're transporting it and then
it really helps to have--this is a little bigger than I need--but this cargo netting
is good, tough material that I can slip underneath that root ball and if it's not
too heavy, I can lift it myself or--these are going to be fairly heavy, so I'll
probably have someone help me lift these up out, get 'em transported, and set 'em
back down into the hole.
So those are some of the tools that you'll need for this particular task and I will
show you kind of a step-by-step. We'll start with pruning the tree down to
hopefully balance things out.
When you prune, you want to make sure you maintain your scaffold branches.
I've had these here for a while and I've tried to train them so that they will grow
the direction I want them to grow. So normally when you prune, you don't want
to take out more than a third of the top in any one year, but because I'm going to
take out a lot of the root ball, I'm going to want to take out at least two thirds of
this growth that is going to be here for this next season.
So here it is mid March. The weather's pretty good. The soil's not frozen and
fortunately, I don't have really rocky ground here, so the digging won't be
too bad. So first off, we'll start pruning this tree down and see how we go from
there.
Make as few a cut as possible, so you want to prune out--take the big cuts.
If you take out the big cuts, you decide what you want to keep. If I wanted to keep
three scaffold branches on this tree, I want them to go in different directions, I
can keep, you know, four or five, but beyond four or five is really not very
useful. I've got three really good branches that are pointing in different
directions, so that's what I'm going to keep on this particular tree.
I like to have them drawn out. Peach trees like to have a little bit of
an open center to them so your fruit will ripen well.
So I'm going to prune out some of these minor scaffold type branches and then
keep the three main branches, which I'm going to keep this branch, this branch,
and this branch. They're going all out in three different directions, giving pretty
good balance to the tree. So we'll start with those.
Now notice I am supporting these branches as they come off so that they don't tear a
strip of bark down the trunk. That's always not a good thing, so...
You can use loppers. You can use hand pruners. These are probably the right
size that I can use loppers. We'll just get some loppers in there, snip those
right off.
We've got this scaffold branch, that scaffold branch, and that scaffold branch
and they're all really quite nice, but I gotta take off a lot more material.
So, as I think through this process here, a lot of these pencil branches from last
year's growth would normally be some of my fruiting wood, but because I'm going to
transplant this, I'm just going to take a lot of those out and not really worry
about the fruit on this particular tree this year.
I get up to a point where I say, "Okay, I want to direct this branch out a little
bit more maybe." And I've got a pretty good branch going out this direction.
This one's going more up and I want to open it up a little bit more, so
I will take off that one right there and do the same thing here.
When you cut these branches, you want to make sure that you cut a branch--cut down
to a branch that's no less than one third the size of the main branch, so if I'm
going to cut back to here, I don't want to cut back to this tiny branch here.
I want to cut back to something that's-- it would be at least one third the size
of the branch that I'm removing it from.
This one's a bit more of a challenge here and where I'm gonna take a lot of the root
off here, I may just go ahead and remove this branch right at this point and keep
that branch coming out that direction. I'm still thinking about it.
I kind of think as I prune.
The other thing to kind of consider when you're doing this is to think about the
maintenance. Is it going to be hard to keep these maintained?
Now, granted, I am taking a lot of material off of this tree, but like I
said, it's something that's kind of gotta be done if I want to give this tree a
chance to survive the process. You take off the little pencil branches.
I don't know if "pencil branches" is an official term, but that's kind of the size
you're looking for when you're pruning your peach tree for the fruiting of the
current season, so that's what I call them.
And I've got one that's kind of right up through the middle. I want to make sure
I take that one out. Anything that's growing back towards the middle I'll take
off just because any hangers that are sticking out from the bottom of the branch
I'll take off. But I'm taking off a lot more than they normally would prune
off these trees.
Okay, well I've really decided I don't want to take this branch off, or this one.
I like the balance that it gives the tree, so I'm going to leave them there.
I'm gonna have to prune pretty seriously going up to that point.
Or after that point. [Snipping.]
Probably six or seven of these pencil- sized branches on each one of these
scaffold branches for your fruiting. These peaches will fruit on last year's growth.
I'm not worried about fruit on these trees this year, so I'm just taking them.
Now hopefully in the next year or two, I'll be able to get these branches growing
a little bit more out the direction I want to, so we'll get maybe some of these
branches going out this direction a little bit better.
And I'm almost done here. Some of these tips of these branches look like they
might have to be pruned off a little bit later in the season.
It's definitely a lot different-looking tree. Again, it's more than I'd normally
try to do on my spring pruning, but this is a different situation, so we'll try it
from that point and see if this tree will survive its transplant.
[Rooster squawking.]
Now before I get too carried away, I want to point out one thing that's very
important is to make sure that you compass your tree. In other words, you orient it
to the sun, especially if it's been out in an environment for a few years like these
have. You orient it to the sun the same way in the hole where you plant it.
So I have this little tag that I'm using for for some research, but I put it on
this south-facing branch so when I get it planted again, I can have this branch
facing south again and it will be oriented the way it needs to be.
Just another thing to consider when you're transplanting trees from one spot
to another.
Now, this transplanting is something that you don't want to try to do when the
leaves are out. You want to make sure you do this--it's mid March right now. It's a
pretty good time. The reason I'm daring to do this right now is because typically
in the springtime, the soil starts to warm up. The roots will grow before you start
getting vegetative growth, so I'm hoping that by transplanting these now, getting
the roots to grow a little bit, cutting back the top a lot, I'll have balance and
I'll have some root growth before there's a big demand on it--the roots will have
some new, fresh roots growing.
When you're digging, you're not going to be able to carry a really big ball of
soil, so you're looking at about twelve to fifteen inches away from the trunk of
the tree is about as big as you're going to be able to handle.
When you dig, you want to dig sideways or parallel to the trunk. You don't want
to dig into the trunk this way because that will break away the ball.
You can't really dig this way, so it's better if you can dig parallel to the
trunk of the tree.
And you're gonna come across roots. When you do those, just break off the roots on
the root ball side. Like I said, there's roots growing all throughout this area
and it's just something we're going to have to do, so that's another reason to
prune these trees away before you get started so you can kind of work underneath
them. [Digging sounds.]
Anyway, be careful to not use the root ball as a prying point. Otherwise, you'll
break that root ball up and find more problems.
We fill the hole just a little bit near the lip of this hole so officially, I can
get down underneath the severed roots that are coming out the bottom.
So I'll clear some of this away.
[Digging sounds.]
Okay, one thing to keep in mind is of course, I do have a place picked where
I want to plant these trees. Don't just dig them up and think, "Okay, now what do
I do with them?" Make sure you've got that place picked out so that you can
move it. Now, I'm down deep enough that I can undercut and cut those roots that
are going out below. You can also, to lighten the weight just a little bit,
shave some of this topsoil off. Chances are it's kind of built up.
Something you want to pay attention to, right here, your root collar, you want to
make sure that when you plant, you plant back to that location. Don't plant it
deeper and don't plant it shallower. It could probably survive a little better
if it's shallower than if you planted it deeper, but it's important to try to get
back to this level right here in the soil.
This tree's about ready to start undercutting. Get some of this topsoil off
so that we've got a little bit less weight when we start packing it. [Digging sound.]
That's another nice thing about these trenching spades is that you can get under
there pretty good.
I'm being careful to not pry against the ball so I don't break that root ball up.
[Digging sound.] Okay, now I can start tipping this and I'll tip it gently so I
can sever the roots underneath a little bit more easily.
All right, looks like we're broken free now. Now that little ball's probably
150, 200 pounds, so I may want to prune off some of these roots.
Some of these roots sticking out may snag a little bit on my tarp or on my cargo net
so I'll prune them off a little bit smoother. All right. It's ready for the
tarp and the cargo net.
[Tarp rustling.] The purpose of the tarp is to keep the root ball from falling
apart, just to kind of hold it together while we're transporting the tree.
So if we tip it over, [Tarp rustling.] that tarp underneath there's a wad under
there and we gently tip it back. Now it'll hold the tarp in place so it's good and
tight, and you can use some 16 or 18 penny nails and just kind of coil that up tight,
take it down. Just pegging it into the root ball will be enough to get
at the soil. We've got that together pretty good. Might pull up a little bit
more right there.
Now we want to do basically the same kind of thing with the cargo net.
I wish I had one that was a little bit smaller, but you work with what
you've got.
An edge along here, so we'll do the same task with a bunch set up underneath.
All right. Now it's ready to go and there's no way I'm going to lift that
myself, so now I gotta wait for my helper to get here.
Make sure I've got the south part facing south and we'll try to take off
the tarp and the cargo net at the same time, so. [Wind blowing.]
You'll notice that although I pruned these trees very heavily, I did leave the
terminal buds on the branches that I've got here and those will help to encourage
the roots to grow. There's a hormone released in those terminal buds that will
encourage the roots to grow and that will help us to have a more successful
transplant. The final step is to stake your tree. One of the important things
to pay attention to when you're staking your tree is to not have the cord too
tight. You want a little bit of slack in that cord so that the tree can flex in
the wind. That will help the tree to strengthen the wood.
So you want to make sure that you've got some slack in there that allows the tree
to bend a little bit, toughens up the roots. And then don't tie your string,
twine, whatever your'e using, don't tie it so tight that you girdle the tree.
You only really need to stake 'em for about a year. After that, there's really
not much point in having the stake on there. So you stake according to the
prevailing winds. If your winds come from the south, then have your stake from the
south. Here, I've got my tree staked. I've got two stakes coming to help protect from
the strongest prevailing winds from the northwest and from the southwest to help
these trees stay in place until they can get strong enough to stand on their own.