Yes, you will need to cut the pot to remove the tree. The degree to which the plant/tree is rooted into the pot depends on the species and the time it spent in the smart pot. I recently planted that acer skutchii I've been posting about. I put it in the smart pot sometime in April and planted it around the end of September. It was firmly rooted into the bottom and sides of the pot. I not only had to cut the pot, but had to cut a fair number of fine roots just to release the thing from the pot. I planted some pawpaws that spent a full growing season in smart pots that didn't root into the pot hardly at all but did make huge taproots at the bottom.

Do Smart Pots air prune like a Rootmaker pot, or are they "trapping" roots or constricting them?

Do you still get some root circling?

There's a nursery in Purcellville, VA (about an hour and a half from me) that grows in Smart Pots and I'm thinking about grabbing a few trees there, so wanted to know what to expect.

As a side note, despite the benefits of root pruning pots, I'd assume one big reason nurseries as a whole are only slowly adopting them is the lack of reusability of the pots. The only ones that appear easily reusable are the black plastic Rootmaker 1/3/5 gallon pots. Plus they're more expensive to start with.

I haven't seen any circling roots on the trees I've removed. They do trap or at least provide a barrier that the feeder roots run into. What seems to happen when these roots run into the outside wall is the roots send out new feeder roots further back. This takes place many, many times resulting in a thick dense root ball full of feeder roots when the tree is removed for planting.

BTW, I've had a couple plants put roots right of the smart pot into the ground while other nearby potted plants have put roots INTO the outer layer of the smart pots.

If they root into the ground underneath, do they still effectively root-prune and/or encourage feeder development on heavily taprooted trees like oaks (or the paw paw you mentioned)?

Yes, they do still encourage good feeder root development. The oaks I have transplanted did not make significant taproots and were mostly fibrous feeder roots.

I used 6 different containers(smart and smooth sided)/sizes(6" to #5) on the pawpaws just as an experiment (I had way more than I actually wanted to plant). The smart pot gave the most fibrous root system of the bunch but a significant tap root developed in all of them except the small 6" farmtek net pot. The 6" net pot did however produce the smallest specimen. This is also the pot I use on all my seedlings for the first year to get the dense root system going.

Here is a link that might be useful: Farmtek 6

I've grown trees in Roottrapper bags and I always have to cut them apart to get it off the root system. You can actually reuse it by simply stapling them back together.

The fabric knitted bag was almost impossible to take off because it seemed that the tree was growing in it for maybe 3 or 4 years at a tree farm.

Roots escaping bags into the ground is no problem. That's extra water and nutrients and keep the from getting blown down. They break off the bag easily when you are ready to plant them.

The Roottrappers are the white ones, and the "knit" fabric are the ones they suggest you do in-ground or in cinder blocks, right?

Or do I have those mixed up?

hairmetal - do you mind sharing the name of the nursery in Purcellville?
BTW - went to Susanna Farms for the first time in donkey's years. OMG they are expensive. But being in MoCo like that, I can't really blame them. Charge what the market will bare. Oddly they had some wierd bargains that almost felt like they'd forgotten to add a 0 to a price. Unfortunately they were too big to fit in my car, like a nice Juniperus rigida pendula, that I think was only $79. It was huge. I really wanted to get something but just couldn't hold my nose tightly enough. I can understand pricing something like a showy Japanese maple high. But they had some little Trochodendrons that were no more than 20" high. Sure they are slow growing when small...but $120? Who's going to buy that? At that size they are about the most anonymous, bland, broad leaved evergreens imaginable. They look like scrounged up bunches of English Ivy. I maybe could have gone up to $65 out of the kindness of my heart, but, $120? Nope. But if they get rich suckers from Potomac to pay those prices, good for them. They do have a nice selection of what I'd call the standard upscale plants...which is getting harder and harder to find. For example also took a quick walk 'round Merrifield's Merrifield location (haha), was disappointed with their selection of similar stuff. If it's showy and marketable, like the Encore Azaleas, they make room for it. Otherwise, overall a more utilitarian, albeit slightly less expensive, selection. And still heavily pushing Leyland Cypresses which is a questionable business practice IMHO.

This post was edited by davidrt28 on Wed, Oct 16, 13 at 23:46

David - it's called Loudoun Nursery - I'll post their URL.

It looks like they are 'by appointment only' at least for retail customers. Their website is a bit wonky (the link to the price/inventory list doesn't always work right), but I am considering calling to set up a time to stop in there.

They seem to have a small but decent inventory.

As far as Merrifield, they didn't impress me last time I was there. Lanky stock that looked rootbound and drought-stressed.

Here is a link that might be useful: Loudoun Nursery

Oh, as a side note, is there a general guide to approximately what caliper tree should correspond to a particular size Rootmaker or Smart Pot container?

David - FYI for you and others in the Mid Atlantic, there is also a nursery up in PA (Harrisburg/Carlisle area) that sells Rootmaker grown trees.

Cool website, but I haven't been there to the nursery. It's about 2 hrs from me so it would be a day trip. I just found out about them, so I have no other info.

Here is a link that might be useful: Woodlawn Trees

I have had to cut the few Smart pots I have used off the plants. It does seem to do a good job with the roots. In every case I have simply overlapped the sides of the bag over each other at the cut and stapled them together and am reusing the bags a second time.