Tree Planting in Omaha, NE

Fall is the best window here and spring is second. Planting in September or October gives roots two cool, damp months to establish before the ground freezes, and then a full spring before the first real heat. Spring planting works but the tree goes into a Nebraska July with a root system it has not finished building. Midsummer planting is possible and it is the hardest on both the tree and the person doing the watering.

Planting depth and water, in that order, and it is nearly always one of those two rather than anything exotic. A tree planted with its root flare buried a few inches too deep will look fine for three or four years and then decline for reasons nobody connects to the day it went in. The second cause is watering that stops after the first summer, when the tree still has two years of establishment left.

No. Emerald ash borer is established in this metro and any ash planted now is a tree you will be injecting every two years for its whole life or removing later. There are better options for every place an ash would have gone, and we will name them.

Something that tops out under about twenty-five feet, which rules out every shade tree people actually want. Serviceberry, hornbeam, crabapple and the smaller maples all work. The alternative is planting a big tree under a wire and paying somebody to butcher it every four years, which is a bad deal for you and worse for the tree.

Nursery stock and planting are warrantable; weather and watering are not, and we would rather say that plainly than write a guarantee with conditions you would only discover on the day you tried to use it. Ask when you book and you will get the exact terms in writing on the estimate.

Smaller than you want. A two-inch caliper tree overtakes a four-inch one within about five years, because a smaller root ball loses proportionally less of its root system in the move and spends less time recovering. Buying big buys you three years of appearance and costs the tree a decade of vigor.