Patio Trees
Trees for places where you it's inconvenient to dig a hole
Could you please tell me if any of the maple, poplar, aspen or cedar trees are recommended or can grow ok in AB in containers? I also would like to know if they can winter outside or if I should bring them into my garage for the winter.
Also, I’m interested in some hostas. I didn’t get around to planting earlier in the season and not sure if I can plant any now.
Generally most trees that are hardier to 1 zone colder or are from climates that have cold winters but not much snowfall are good candidates. E.g. Our farm is zone 3. Zone 2 or Zone 1 trees are much more likely to do well. Mountain hemlock is nominally zone 3, but grows where it gets LOTS of snow in winter. I killed 500 of them learning this.
The larger the container, the better their chances in winter. An insulated container is better. Best is a container on the ground, with insulation on the sides, but not the bottom. If on a deck, the bottom should be insulated too.
Contaner survival is a matter of how fast the roots cool. Trees that I routinely overwinter in containers:
Tree candidates
- Siberian Crabapple
- Northwest poplar, Okanese Poplar trembling aspen, balsam poplar.
- White, Black, Black Hills, and Meyers spruce
- Scots, mugo, mountain, lodgepole, jack, swiss stone pine
- Balsam fir, Siberian fir.
- Siberian Larch, Tamarack
- Amur Maple
- Ohio buckeye
- Green Alder
- American Elm
- Mountain Ash.
- paper birch
Shrub candidates
- Wild rose
- Wolf willow
- Canada buffaloberry
- Silver buffaloverry
- Lilacs
- Golden currant
- Haskaps
- Coyote willow, pussy willow, bog willow, golden willow, flame willow, iceberg alley willow.
- Common dogwood, purpletwig dogwood.
- Caragana
- Cotoneaster
Trees that don't work well:
- Russian Olive
- Pagoda dogwood.
- Babylonian Lace weeping willow.
- Most fruit trees.
Shrubs that don't work well
- Most roses, even ones like Explorer series, Artist series. Rugosa rose is possible.
- Ninebark
- Hazelnut
- Belgian Red willow
- Nanking cherry
- Romance cherries.
- Forsythia
- Honeysuckle
The Container
My tax preparer had a spruce tree on his deck in a 2 foot cube box. The box was lined with 1" of styrofoam, and had suitable drainage through the bottom. That tree was happy on the deck until it hit the deck 2 floors up. The depth is excessive. 12-16" is fine.
Having the container in firm contact with the ground will help it survive. The ground acts as a source of heat. On a deck, you can put it on a heat mat, then plug the heat mat into one of these plugs that has a thermostat set at -7 C. This will keep the roots warm enough. In this case the layering is:
- Slab of foam
- heat mat
- Insulated box with no insulation in bottom.
If the heat mat runs, you should be able to plant anything hardy in zone 3, assuming we don't get another -53 C winter.
Lodgepole Pine in our front yard.
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