Home

Trees

Advice

Growers

Design

Sellers

Windthrow

Treefarm

Vendors

Our Forests

Almanac

Links

Soapbox

Ways to Reduce Windthrow of Potted Trees & Shrubs

I hope I'm using the right word. I know that forestry people use windthrow to talk about trees knocked down by the wind. In the forest it's just a bit difficult to put them back up. In the nursery/garden centre it's a nuisance.

Method 1: Support pallets.

This is the best method, in opinion, but it's also the hardest to set up. It also requires that you know ahead of time what pots your trees are coming in, and that you have a supply of the same or slightly larger pot.

What you do is screw socket pots to a pallet, then set the pot with the tree in it inside the socket pot. Since the bottom pot is fastened down, to fall over the tree pot has to stretch the socket pot out of shape.

You need to use the heavier pots for this. The really thin blow-molded pots don't have what it takes. If the socket pot is too flexible it may need to be doubled up.

To keep the screw from ripping out of the socket pot, make a 'washer' with scrap of plywood or OSB. This scrap should come as close to filling up the bottom as you can, consistent with making them quickly. So for a 1 gallon trade pot they should be about 4" square.

If you use OSB, find scraps of the stuff they use for exterior cladding on houses. While it still falls apart after getting wet, it doesn't instantly fall apart. A good painting especially the cut edges will increase it's life span. Recycled paint from the eco centre will give you the paint. Oil works better than latex for this. Painting is enough hassle, that it may be quicker just to replace the washers when they start to fall apart. I think you can get at least one season from OSB, two seasons from plywood.

Another alternative is to use fender washers. These are metal washers where the hole is small compared to the washer. So a 2" washer may have only a 1/4" hole. I've not found a supply yet. You could also use any supply of heavy gauge scrap sheet metal.

The good heavy pallets are often made of hardwood. Red oak and white ash seem to be common for this. After the pallet has aged, it is all but impossible to put a nail into it. For screws you want a pilot hole.

For screws, go to a hardware store and order the screws that are used to put on metal roofing. They have a bolt head, and a wide flange. Buy the corresponding nut driver. This allows you to put them in fairly fast with a good cordless drill. They are fairly thick, so they will get a good grip on the pallet.

Take into account the size of the trees when you decide how many socket pots to put down. The usual trade-off applies: Put them far apart for attractive display, crowd together to get more stock in a small space. I recommend the former. Put your spare stock in back using one of the other quick and dirty methods mentioned later. For 1 gallon pots you can probably put 9-12 sockets per pallet.

The first year you try this, you may want to postpone the decision. Make up a few pallets of each size you think will work. For the rest, just stockpile the materials to make them.

(With the materials pre-done, they go together fairly fast -- under 2 minutes per socket. This can be a good job for a new employee as it tests if he can follow directions, is easy to verify, and if he doesn't do it right, it won't kill anything.)

So now you have a bunch of ratty old pallets with pots screwed to them. The pots may not fall over, but it looks ugly.

Wooden stakes and a 2x6 make a front edge. Leave a few inches between it and the pallets. Fill in with sawdust and bark chips. (Clean-it Green-it has bark chips for cheap.)

Step back and admire: In essence the trees are sunk into the ground. The bark keeps the pot from heating in the sun. Pallet and bark means there no problem with drainage. Since the bark is close to the rim, it gives the customer a good idea of how the tree will look when it is in the ground at home.

Method 2: Stakes.

For this method you need a bunch of stakes that are about a foot and a half longer than the height of the pot. For each tree you need a stake, a small spacer block, and a rectangle of OSB or plywood, about 4 x X inches. X is determined by the size of the pot. The spacer block is about 3" long, and the same width as the stake.

Screw the three pieces together, so that the top ends of each are flush. The long dimension of the spacer block is vertical. The long dimension of the OSB is horizontal. You should end up with a T, with the bottom edge of the cross bar of the T overhanging the spacer block.

Put a representative pot in the ground, and thwack this stake in until the T overhang grips the pot. Here's where the width comes on. You want the width to just fit into the pot. Too wide you won't get it in. Too narrow and the pot can twist around.

You don't have to remove the stake to remove the tree. Grab the bottom of the pot and pull away from the stake. Customers generally won't figure this out, so this works best at a 'full service' centre as opposed to a 'self serve'.

Method 3: Wires.

Rent a post pounder and set up rows of fence posts along your rows. Put them in a good 3 feet. Run a strand of high tensile strength wire on the posts, and make it tight.

Place your tree near the wire, and attach to the wire with a a Velcro plant tie. These will slip along the length of the wire, Once you have a spacing you like, undo the plant tie and put two blobs of 'shoo-goo' a couple inches apart. Once the goo has set, then put the tie back on, taking a full turn around the wire. It shouldn't slide past the beads of shoo-goo.

Alternatives. Using a softer wire than the HTS fence wire take a 2 foot long chunk and make a loop in the middle with the ends stick out both sides. Place the loop on the fence wire, Wrap each end around the fence wire at least 8-10 times. Now the plant tie can go through the loop.

Method 4: Bale corral.

This method works well for storage in the back. It can be used for display, but it takes a lot of room and a lot of bales.

You need a supply of straw or hay bales. If you get it by the truck load, (500 bales) it typically will cost under 2 per bale. (If you are paying more than that, call me. I'll give you the name of my supplier.)

Start by making a long 'L' with the bales. Place your pots along the length of the L. Place a second row. Place a third row. The width of the row is determined by several things: If this is just temporary, you can make it as wide as you want. If the plants are going to be here long enough to do some growing, you want some light to get to the interior. If the plants are tall and skinny, you may put More rows. A 3'wide row allows you to get access to the middle of the row to pull a specific specimen, or to weed. More than 5 feet makes hand watering awkward. Make it 10' and put a pair of stacked bales every 16 feet in the middle, you can use a narrow strip oscillating sprinkler to water them.

Partial corral: If the wind that knocks your trees over comes from a consistent direction, it may be sufficient just to use the bales as support for the down wind row of trees.

Display with bales: Place one row of bales at the back of your display.
Put one bale perpendicular to the back row. Put a row of trees against the this single bale. Put down another bale. Repeat. This works best for 5 gallon and up pot so that the display is only 2-3 pots deep. There is no front support, so it should not face away from the storm winds.

Method 5: Snow fence corral.

You will need a pile of T bar stakes, and rolls of snow fence/safety fence. I think the black resists UV longer. In essence make a set of 'stalls' for your trees. Lay out two rows of posts about 10 feet apart. Attach fence to the back and sides making a big square C. Attache shorter chunks going between the rows parallel to the sides, turning it into an E with multiple centre strokes, or rather like a rake. The trees fit in the stalls.

Orientation: The open end is the weak spot. So face the open end into the direction where the strong winds come from. For me this is the north west, but your yard layout may give you protection from this direction.