Did the rootball just recently shift or is this something that happened just after planting and then not addressed?

Can you describe how they were planted (B&B with burlap left in place when planted, bare rooted, pot-grown, potbound roots addressed at planting, etc, etc)?

Thanks, Brandon.

They recently shifted after being straight for two+ years after planting. They have withstood 60-70 mph windgusts and heavy rainfalls without any movement. The canopies are getting denser now and really catch the wind more than other small trees I've planted.

They were balled and burlapped and in metal baskets when I saw them at the nursery. They were discounting leftover stock from spring that had not sold. The 3' diameter rootballs were big enough and heavy enough to make them difficult to roll without mechanical help. There were not many roots visible, and the burlap around the ball was disintegrating when I planted them.

I dug huge holes almost 4' across, rolled/pushed them in, straightened them, then filled in the soil and tamped it down, mulched it, and watered them well and often. And that was in fall 2010.

Thanks for any suggestions and comments!

vince

Pot-bound inside the soil balls, where there is a birdcage of deformed roots near the base of the trunk - it doesn't matter if they came out of a field if they were left too long in small pots or bands before being lined out in the field.

There is probably hardly any grafted stock in particular that is not sitting on badly deformed roots; the percentage of roots that make it out of the wad is often apparently enough to make a soil ball around at final lifting for sale - or there are a lot of what I have heard called "false balls" being produced. I have some personal encounters with these, having discovered at planting time that most of the soil ball had been formed around much smaller root systems, with a lot of the ball being unoccupied.

trees bend.. they dont stay that way ..

hence the suggestion .. that the ball slipped ...

do i recall horrible clay soil???

if it were me.... i would dig on the side away from the lean ... half way around... and under cut a bit.. and straighten it.. and then stake it so it cant reset itself ... heavily on the side the prevailing wind hits it ...

i have bare rooted trees that size ... and if you did not unwind the roots.. plant it in native soil ... or get rid of most of the peat media from a pot ... i MIGHT suggest you dig them up.. bare roots them.. and plant then properly in your soil ...

nothing like a friendly insult to get my juices flowing.. lol.. i got you back in the thuja post.. before i even read this one.. lol .. so.. we are even ... all in good fun.. i presume ....

give us more history on how these came to be planted here ...

any new fixes on that glorious house.. i seem to think you were adding windows or something this summer???

ken

Interesting postings about the rootball-within-a-soil-ball. Makes sense. The trees have leafed out well, showed no signs of stress since being planted, and made it through the drought of 2012 with minimal attention.

I will dig on the west side and undercut them, I don't think it will be too difficult or stressful to straighten them out at this time of year, and I can always use the excercise. And then I'll stake them pretty good to prevent any strange leanings in the future.

As for the house, the main porch floor really, really needed to be painted, so I had to decide just what colors to change and use, not just on the porch but on the rest of the house. Tough choices for a guy to make!

I've been busy disassembling the railings and sanding the entire floor and repainting the parts I wanted to while the weather is cooperating. And it's been going on for a month and a half....and will be done this weekend. Yay!

I have figured out where I want to add/replace windows, and am in the process of finding someone who can recreate the original sashes so they match the rest of the house instead of buying whatever the big box stores have that doesn't match. And then I get to do the fun of building the rest of the window and installing them.....next year?

Thanks!

vince

Just don't beat yourself up too much. It is not like you built a tower in Pisa that really should be straight. Trees all do their little bit of a thing.

If you decide to stake them use something gentle on the bark. The wife's, or whoever comes over's old pantyhose seem good for my smaller transplants.

Good to see someone who is not afraid to pick up a shovel and do some heavy exercise work. It seems you're looking forward to it!
What's that Thuja doing so close to the house and in front of the windows?
Mike

Have you exposed the root flare?

Your pic is a classic sign of plant that has sucken and is now planted too deeply. The roots then grow much shallower.

The trunk is still very straight for a Ginkgo exposed to strong winds. I have a couple that have developed a slight bow from their exposure.

Without being there my theory is that you have root issues (planted too deep) and not a wind problem.

The only way to deal with root deformities is to expose the roots and make any repairs that may be possible - specimens too badly deformed by small containers may not be recoverable.

It is not normal for long-lived, large-growing ancient tree species like the ginkgo to be bothered by wind. During the Great Gale in Britain (October 1987) not one established ginkgo (or redwood) was seen to have blown over. Thousands of examples of other kinds of trees did go down.

This post was edited by bboy on Tue, Nov 5, 13 at 15:57

Thanks for all the info!

To answer the questions....

The root flare is exposed, though wind and rain are always blowing mulch and leaves in that cavity, so I clear it out often. I do keep a good mulch ring around it that makes it look like it has sunk.

I will do like Ken said and try digging on the west side and see if I can loosen them enough to straighten them out and stake them, with something gentle on the bark.

I'd like to dig them out and see what the root ball looks like, but I'm afraid I'll create a bigger mess for myself as they might be a bit too big to handle once dug up. And now the ground is wet and heavy, too. If they were not doing well, I'd be more tempted to experiment.

There is a STOP sign on my corner that also catches the wind and the pole too can be moved back and forth in the e/w directions, but not n/s. Another sign that is oriented differently nearby is solid and can't be moved in any direction.

Oh, I do like to dig, and have done plenty of it. I've broken one of these along the way:

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B000B6Q6BA/ref=oh_details_o01_s00_i00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

Broken, not just bent. I need to get back to working out more now that I'm confined indoors for winter/darkness. And no, I don't have a snow blower!

Thuja is decorative, and may get moved a little next year when I build a proper stairway to replace the concrete eyesore that replaced the original stairs. It doesn't block the windows. I think the growth will still be slow as it doesn't get lots of sun all year facing north.

vince

One of the hardest things landscaping new hires had to learn from me was the difference between a shovel and a pry bar. Fiskars makes a good shovel. You must have really put it to the test.
The other thing was, a wheelbarrow has a wheel. Move it to where you're working rather than repeatedly take things to it.
I could go on, but that's worthy of a new thread. Leaf rakes, push brooms, and loppers were the tools most likely to be broken.
Mike

I don't think it's leaning enough to warrant doing anything to it. The top will straighten out and the trunk will have a gentle curve. What's wrong with that? It makes the tree a little more interesting to me. You're not growing the tree for the lumber trade, are you?
Mike

I'd agree, if its at the proper planting level, currently stablized and puts out new growth I wouldn't dare go digging at a b&b planting.

If the bend bothered me I'd pull it back and stake at one side for a full year to allow the plant to put out caliper.

But that was a tree that had an actual bow. I get the feeling your tree isn't stablized, hence root issues.

Just an update on an older thread....

I still haven't staked the Gingko trees, but it's high on my list, especially with the ground wet from all the rain tonight.

In this post is a picture of the tree during a rainstorm. I'll make another post showing the same tree a few minutes later getting hit by a gust of wind.

vince

And here is a shot of the same tree getting hit by one of many gusts of wind tonight alone. No wonder they lean a bit....

vince

How'd the ginkgoes fare? I have a two year leaner but not due to root slippage. I think it will just correct itself over time as my tree begins to fill in more.