Thank you all for putting RedSun in line. He seems not wanting to get it. Agree, he shouldn't even be commenting here,...not hes zone, for some reason, he has something against me. >>Why do you care how much $ the nurseries make?? >>Just to be fair, the nurserymen are not easy. Some of the wholesale growers sell the grafted fruit trees for less than $10 each. With the shrinkage and all the other costs, they do not make much money. North of the border it is more like $50.00 If you have money to burn then it doesn't matter, all I want is to make aware that you can save some time and money by planting in spring. Putting trees in the fall you'll end up loose more, most don't care about warranty, [purchase was done last year] and just order again,...which means more sales for the nursery, [good for the nursery] but with the expense / loss of the buyer. I don't buy many trees, mostly I grow from seeds then graft, ...just had the urge last spring to test some zone pushing variates, [couple zone 4] from Green Barn, unfortunately they sent me 4 dead trees, [out of 10] 40%, most of the rest were disappointing. I'm suspecting that trees were stored improperly, roots looked like they were put in water for weeks if not month! In this case I guess it wouldn't have mattered if planted in the fall. Getting trees in spring, [growing season] makes only sense, ...you can give the nursery feed back right away for progress without a half year delay,...fresh in memory! Yes, it was a bad experience! Here is a link that might be useful: http://forums2.gardenweb.com/forums/load/fruit/msg050012202514.html?36

Thank you! :) I tried everything this year to get a Sunrise Coneflower! I have two others in the ground...one from ebay that didn't get big enough to even bloom this year....and one from SpringHill Nursery that didn't get a bloom either. I live in such a rural area that I can't even find them around here! I am praying that next summer I'll have at least one!! I have 14 bare roots to put in now. Surely...HOPEFULLY...I'll get one!

Hi Vettin One year I received a rather large order of bare-roots rather late in the season, two days before I was about to leave the country. I didn't have time to plant them, but I dug them all in a hole in the ground under some pine trees, and covered them with about 8 inches of sandy soil with pine needles an bark. All roses survived without any winter damage, among them some hybrid teas, hybrid perpetuals, climbers, portlands. I was more worried about black canes and fungus, but not a trace when I dug them up in March. Some had started to developed roots. I god this advice from an old gardener that told me this was how they stored the crop of roses in the old days before refrigerators. I think Peace and Chicago Peace is a bit more hardy than Souvenir de la Malmaison. I doubt Zephirine is much less tender. If you have a long growing season that helps a lot. Whatever you do, I think they all will survive, but how many dead canes is all ways the issue.

Are you talking about 3 gal potted plant or quart size potted plant? If it is a 3 galon, then your plant will most likely be bigger than the bareroot. You can buy it now, dig a hole big enough for the pot, and place the plant and pot in the hole. By fall, you can remove the plant from pot and plant it wherever you want. In fact if you are so inclined, you can divide it into halves or threes and you will get 2 - 3 nice size divisions from the plant without hurting the plant at all.