I don't know if you'll find any locally at this time of the year. I don't see bare-root trees in any of the stores I am in during the fall, The bare root trees usually show up in nurseries and stores down here in southcentral OK in January or early February, but I am not sure I've ever seen a bare-root mulberry. Usually they are in pots.

You might try the websites of Bob Wells Nursery (also in Texas), though I don't remember seeing any mulberry trees on their website a few months ago. Or, Stark Brothers (they are in Missouri but sell online and do ship in the fall and winter for some items) likely has mulberry trees on their website, but probably in pots and not bareroot.

Be sure that you really want a fruiting mulberry because once you have one, the birds will "plant" their seeds everywhere and you'll have mulberry weeds popping up all over every year once the tree you plant is large enough to bear fruit. You have to religiously weed out every mulberry seedling that pops up or they'll take over.

OIKOS Tree Crops also sells many kinds of native trees, so they might have mulberries. They usually ship in very small pots. I'll link their website below. Don't blame me if you find about three dozen other things on their website that you want to plant. They have lots of native plants that are very hard to find.

Dawn

Here is a link that might be useful: OIKOS Tree Crops

Dawn,

Thanks for the tips. I had already looked at Bob Wells and Legg Creek Farm but none either. I admit I've seen very few barefoot mulberries offered, but knew Womack's sold them so wasn't really worried.

Fyi, looks like I'm about to close on some acreage near Caney, OK so I'll finally have some land. I'll be another Texas transplant to Oklahoma like you. Used to live in Fort Worth also!

Charles

Hi Charles, Well, OIKOS has them and their quality is great. I imagine that Stark Brothers does too, or if you don't mind shopping online, places like One Green World and Dave Wilson Nursery would have them.

Congrats on purchasing the land near Caney! I love Fort Worth. I was born there and lived there for the first 39 years of my life, but when we moved here to Love County, deep in my soul I finally felt like I had "come home". I cannot explain it, other than to reason that Fort Worth simply got too big and too crowded and too full of people for me. Before Tim and I got married in the early 1980s, I made him promise me he'd never ask me to leave Texas. Then, by the mid- to late1990s, I was the one who wanted to move away from Texas. (Though, obviously, we didn't move far since we still have Texas to our west, south and east.) Now when we go there to visit family, even though I love my family, I can't wait to head back home to Oklahoma. The relentless building of more, more, more houses, strip malls, shopping centers, etc., just drives me crazy. I cannot believe how much of the metro area has turned from rural and semi-rural to full-blown city areas in just the last 10-20 years. It is so hard to see areas that once were lovely rolling countryside filled with grasslands and forests turned into endless concrete. One of my favorite things about living here is that we're still really rural, at least in our part of Love County. I guess if you're going to be living in Caney, you'll be in a largely rural to semi-rural area too.

Birds plant mulberries for me all the time and I spend a ridiculous amount of time removing them. If you don't remove the seedlings them while they're small, they're hard to get rid of. I never let the mulberries stay long enough for them to get big enough for me to find out if they are fruit-bearing or fruitless ones. We had mulberry trees across the street from us in Fort Worth when I was a kid, and also growing in the park across the street. I loved eating those berries, but do have vivid memories of the big purple blotches the berries left on the driveway and the roadway.

Good luck finding a mulberry tree or two to plant. You also might look at the OK Forestry website. They sell small trees in bundles for conservation purposes. I don't know if they have mulberries, but I know they have some other native fruiting trees, so maybe they have the mulberries as well. They sell tiny trees in bundles in the spring, and you can order them right on their website. They usually get the order form for the current year up in January or February and there's usually a specific deadline for getting orders submitted to them.

Dawn

Yes, I feel very much the same way, though my heart revolted at first when my brother bought land in OK. We're born and bred Texans (rural East Texas), and it almost felt traitorous to consider leaving. But now little old Denton has become too big for me. Traffic, urban development, etc, all that you said. Though an even greater incentive came when I realized the difference in property taxes. I paid over $4k a year back when I had a home near TCU in Fort Worth, and have a good friend who now pays about $6k in a different area. Taxes on this new place (1500 sq ft plus 40 acres) are little over $700. You can actually afford to retire in Oklahoma. The states apparently fund their activities very differently.

I'll look up the OK Forestry site too. Have been looking at Oikos. Stark seems only to have 'em in pots. Seems like barefoot trees are cheaper and they supposedly get a head start, being able to start establishing themselves even before spring. But perhaps you have something to say about the advantages and disadvantages. You certainly don't seem to be warning against potted trees.

Charles