Good morning to all! Low of 30 last night, a few sprinkles, then a few snow flakes... really? Forecast has us going up to 63 today with some breezes. They say sunny, but right now total cloud cover..... I guess we will see....
Quote- - - Kyle - - - “ My wifey is not much of a green thumb, but I have instilled a little bit of it in my daughter. Pines looks good, I'm guessing you'll keep them in the pots? They will grow to big to be planted there??? Maybe they'll grow tall and straight like pine trees do? “
First off, the wifey corrected me... the pines will be in their 5th season, not 4th. They will stay in those containers for at least another year, probably 2. Then they will get planted in the ground. We have found growing them in containers drastically improves their survival “ in the wild “. If I can remember, I will take pics of the ones that were planted in the ground 3 years ago, and the ones 2 years ago.
We tried planting a seedling bed of 50 - 12 inch tall ones about 5 years ago... the critters broke in to the area and ate / chewed every single one down to ground level, something dug up about half of the roots. That was when we started to do the containers. I have watched rabbits chew the bark off of 2-3 ft tall trees when the snow has been bad, naturally killing the tree.
They do grow relatively upright / straight, but they are not the Lodge Pole pines that are really straight up. These are Afghan Pines, primarily used for windbreaks.
Sorry to get so long winded..... the high desert has many challenges, especially when it comes to growing things....