I also got some super chopped trees from Bay Laurel several years ago. I have gotten Dave Wilson trees from other sources with much bigger roots so I suspect Bay Laurel is doing the chopping to fit things in lighter and smaller boxes. Several of the trees did not make it and I discussed the short roots with them when getting my free replacements. The replacements the next year had bigger roots so I had assumed they were leaving more roots on but I guess not. I don't think this is a very good practice at all and it makes me wonder if its best to skip them and get DW from Peaceful Valley or Sanhedrin instead.

Scott

Have faith, they will grow. My first nursery mentor could take a tree I thought was dead, and prune it as you describe and bring it back to life. You mention they are good size, I assume you are referring to trunk caliper which is a storehouse of energy. Al

When I asked my old mentor(Joe Solemone)why he pruned the roots so much, his reply was, "Pruning the roots stimulates growth of the roots, as much as pruning the tree stimulates tree growth". Anyway the results I saw seemed to work. Al

Al: Your buddy Joe has a good point. My experience says the new roots come from near the cut ends just like tops respond to heading cuts.

My trees from Bay Laurel have never had heavily chopped roots. I've gotten trees of larger caliper than I wanted. Only problem with that is low branching can be limited. From now on I'm going to specify exactly what I want. I think they'll listen and comply as much as possible. There is a comments section to fill out when you order.

I've ordered bare root fruit trees from Bay Laurel for several years now. They have always been high quality as far as I am able to tell and they have all done well for me. Last year however was a different story--a fig and a persimmon arrived about 3 weeks late, and it looked like I got DWN's spindly leftovers. Meanwhile a local nursery had those exact DWN trees for sale, much healthier than the ones from BL. :( I wonder if the company is undergoing changes that are affecting the consumer?

The best trees I ever got were from Baylaurel. This was several years ago. The only bad thing I can say about them is that they had already broken dormancy by the time they arrived in my Z5a. I love their selection.

I think the permaculture boom has caught some of the more reputable nurseries short a little bit. I would say that all of my recent purchases have been midly disappointing. Also, remember this is the internet age. Conscientious new buyers can quickly descend on the quality producers and overwhelm them a little.

Al has a good point that there is a positive side to root pruning. Also I should have mentioned that the trees that died had started to leaf out and it was the combination that killed them. Still, I think they way overdid the root pruning, 3" roots means 90% of the root mass was removed. Bay Laurel is a great outfit in every other respect, I have always had good interactions with them.

Scott

I chose Bay Laurel, because they participate in Dave Wilson's custom order program. There were 2 trees that I wanted to custom order as they are not readily available. By special ordering, I got them on my choice of rootstock.

The trees looked good when they arrived. Packaging was good. Shipping charges are extra expensive. Not complaining. I'll pay to get the trees I want. I'm worried about the very tiny root systems, but I'll cross my fingers and hope for the best.

I just got a shipment. Did not unwrap the roots yet but there seems to be enough in there. My complaint, hopefully everyone will tell me its not a problem, is that about 6 inches up from the graft union on my Blood Cling peach there is a 2 inch scar. Looks like last year it was scrapped pretty good and it healed around it. Just dont like seeing that on a new tree. Is it anything to worry about?

I have had some trees within the first couple of years that looked like a bobcat used them for a scratching post. They all grew out of it within 3 or four years with no permanent damage. I think you have nothing to be concerned about, call the nursery if you think otherwise. Al

I too received my order from Bay Laurel about a week and a half ago. The 4 trees were nicely packaged and I noticed the roots pruned back considerably. I figured there was a reason for it more than making them fit better in the packaging. I've heard of shaking all the dirt off a potted fruit tree and pruning the roots back before planting so I just figured that's what they did. I expect them to grow just fine.

The shipping was pretty fair I thought. I've ordered one tree before from Raintree and paid more for shipping than I did for 4 trees from Bay Laurel.

All I ordered from Bay Laurel this year was a couple blackberries and the shipping was more than the plants :-( Their quality was good however.

I doubt a severely root-pruned tree will die unless it is under stress from something else. However, such a severe root pruning does slow down initial development and increases the risk that some event that would normally be "bad" will end up being "horrible" (death of tree) due to this deficit. So, I will be looking for other sources of DWN trees next time myself. Trees of Antiquity sells many DWN stone fruits and the roots have always been very nice on them. I have not ordered from Peaceful Valley or Sanhedrin but I doubt they are pruning the roots since that is not a normal practice.

Scott

Scott, I think you'd be really pleased with the DWN stock at Peaceful Valley. I've placed 5 orders (about 35 trees) from Peaceful Valley and can confirm that they normally only prune the roots very minimally. In fact, their trees have the largest root systems I've ever received from any nursery. I've only placed one order with Sanhedrin this year for 2 peach trees and one had very pruned roots (all to about 5-6") and the other had minimal pruning. I was still pleased with my Sanhedrin order and would still use them again for DWN varieties not offered at PV, but neither of the 2 peach trees approached the huge root system of those I received from PV. Plus, PV is an incredible value to boot. I don't know of any other non-wholesale source you can get 5/8-3/4", 4-5' healthy stock for about $20-23 a tree, shipped.

Thanks for that information. Even 5-6" of root from Sanhedrin is a lot of root compared to the 2-3" stubs that I got from Bay Laurel several years ago.

I buy a lot of stuff from PV, they are not the best at customer service but many things they sell nobody else does (and, now we can add non-root-pruned DWN trees to that list!)

Scott

Bay Laurel sent me a jujube last year with extremely chopped back roots. I called them immediately but pretty much got treated like an idiot. Of course the tree died. I used the guarantee money to buy several more trees which were ok, but they stuck me with an unexplained $12 charge on the invoice. I'm switching to Sanhedrin.