With my wife and daughters at my side, I planted my first 2 trees on Sunday. At Forest Park Nature Center’s Earth Day Festival, we received 2 free trees from the Nature Center. We picked out and planted a white oak in the back yard and a red sumac in the front yard. Both of them are very young – probably about 18 inches above the ground. We were in a bit of a hurry to get them planted once we got home because it was getting dark, and we still had supplies to buy. I drove over to Lowe’s to buy a spade shovel and some mulch.
The placement of the trees took some strategy. We had to consider that the white oak can get up to 50 to 70 feet tall. We didn’t want to hit any power lines, wanted to keep the yard wide open for the girls to play, and didn’t want the neighbors’ yards to get inundated with leaves from our tree in the fall. In the front, we hope to provide some moderate shade to the front of the house while not blocking the sun’s rays to the roof in case we are able to afford solar panels in the future.
I found out after the fact that there may have been a better method of planting the trees. The instruction sheets on planting the trees didn’t call for water until the hole was filled in. However, we found another reference that directed you to add water to the hole before filling it in. I don’t think it is a critical point – we should be fine.
We will be adding a gallon of water daily to each tree for 2 weeks. I wish we had a rain barrel set up to capture rain water, but that costs more money that I can shell out at the moment. So, we will be using water from the tap.
I sincerely hope that the trees take hold as I want my children to witness the marvel of watching the trees mature.
Sustainably yours,
Todd
