30 feet? - well give or take a few - all over my back yard! Maybe I exaggerated a bit - but not too much. Most of my tomatoes are started in yogurt cups, put into plastic shoebox size containers. When I harden them off, they are put outside under a shade tree with another shoebox placed on top (mini-greenhouse). I realize we can grow year-round in our weather, but tomatoes, peppers, etc., still need special care when putting them outside. Bejay

I find that many times when someone thinks someone else is not being polite on here, they're just not familiar with the way that person writes/expresses themselves. I know of at least three people on here that are routinely accused of being impolite, but are really really good people (at least I think they are). All three of them just try to give good advice the best way they can, but do so in individualistic ways that some people take wrong. I'm sure that everyone writes things, at times, that they don't realize how it sounds until later on. It's part of life on the internet. Krycek1984, your fairly new around here and I know you've had a couple of run-ins with people, but I bet, if you stick around, you will find that even those people are really generally pretty friendly once you get to know them. Horticultural knowledge on Gardenweb ranges from contributors with world-wide renowned expertise (really, I'm not exaggerating) to complete beginners with their own strange ideas (lol). Once you get to know who's who and how people express themselves, you'll feel more and more at home (hopefully, at least).

Just wanted to post a followup on this for anyone who may come across this thread in the future. I always hate finding a thread full of good information, but then not knowing if it actually worked or not. I replaced the trees that died, and the new ones are doing great. Here's what I did differently. (I know that for some of you, these may be the most obvious things in the world, but some of us are still learning, even from our really stupid, obvious mistakes). - I waited til it cooled down. It got cooler earlier than I expected, so I was able to do the transplants a couple weeks ago. - Smaller trees. I did still really need the height, so I went with 6-8' tall trees (some are about 9', actually), but I got much smaller caliper (trunk diameter) trees. I tried for no more than about 1.5" caliper, measured 6 inches above the root flare (some are a little closer to 1.75"). They're definitely much less full, but they'll get the job done until they fill in and grow up a little. It helps a lot that I found out that for screening purposes, eastern red cedars can be planted as close as 4' apart. Bigger, fuller trees really aren't needed at that spacing. - No starter fertilizer. These are trees, not grass. I used some Fertilome Root Stimulator & Starter solution (per the manufacturer's instructions) when I planted, and may add some Superthrive in a couple weeks, just to get the roots really going before winter kicks in. - Much better care of the root balls. I didn't make perfect root balls, as such - after reading a whole lot of back and forth between scientists on the benefits of good root balls vs taking as much root as possible, even if they're outside of the dirt, I kind of went with a hybrid approach. I got as much root as I could, and kept as much dirt on them as possible. I kept all of them covered with dirt of some type for as much time as possible, and ensured that they never actually got dry. Total time from digging to planting was less than 4 hours, and most of that time, they were in some kind of dirt. - I watered with a sprinkler for a few days, to let moisture come in through both the roots & leaves, in case the roots were having difficulty of some kind. Then I found out about Wilt-Pruf (prevents moisture from escaping through the leaves, which causes a lot of transplant shock). I applied it per the manufacturer's instructions, and am now watering with a soaker hose, as Wilt-Pruf should also prevent absorption of water through the leaves. - I haven't mulched yet (life got in the way unexpectedly), but I will be soon. Something else I came across in my reading - mulch isn't required, but most bushes or trees that are mulched in their first year or two after transplant show 20%+ more growth than those that aren't. Since growth & size are my primary goals here, it's worth having that junk in my yard for a year or two. We'll see what, if anything, will grow under these trees once they're established, but for now, it's gonna be mulch. Thanks, everybody, for all the insights provided. Hopefully these results, and what I did to get them, will be useful to someone else in the future, too.

Brendan, the depth of planting is indeed a serious issue, but not one which would account for the early failure of a transplanted tree. Its manifestations only come on later, after the tree has been in the ground for some time. So we can cross that out. But......I do want to disabuse you and anyone else reading this of the notion that the top of the root ball of a B&B tree is automatically the correct planting depth. It's not. Picture this tree, and a whole bunch just like it, growing in a row in a nursery. Weeds are always a problem and periodically, the nursery personnel will run a tractor with a cultivator of some kind down those rows to help get rid of these weeds. In the process, much soil may get heaped up around the tree trunk's base. Now, when that tree gets dug for sale, it has it's root ball with a bunch of extra dirt piled up on it. So when that gets planted, if that ball height is taken to be the proper depth of planting, one will actually be planting it too deep. We have already taken as much as 18 inches of soil off the top of a root ball, looking for the root flare, that swollen area where trunk meets roots. This root flare, when done correctly, should still be visible when tree is planted. This, and only this, is the proper guidance for depth of planting of a B&B tree. +oM