Tights (you might call them pantyhose or such)...and as I have a fondness for lurid ones, I can do colour-co-ordinating. Very durable, soft and, most importantly to me, always accessible. Have used bicycle inner tubes at a pinch too.

Both of Campanulas suggestions are flexible, and this is important, supporting the tree while allowing it to move some.

I use knee Hi's

I 2nd or 3rd knee highs or panty hose. I tie a leg in a circle a bit wider than the tree then tie 3 pieces of fishing line to that. The free end of the fishing line I try to tie to stakes so the circle doesn't touch the trunk unless it is blowing.

It usually touches just a little

how big are the trees ... were they bare root .. potted or BB ..

and why do you think they need staking??? .. its usually frowned upon .. unless there is a specific planting problem

other wise.. good old fashioned ALL COTTON clothes line ... it will rot off.. if you forget to take it off .. no plastic in the middle stuff ...

ken

Thanks guys. The knee highs seems like a simple choice.

@ken, the trees were bare root and they recommended staking the apple trees. I did the peach too just until I can get comfy there are no issues and I'll just pull the stake out.

I'd recommend not staking the trees in the manner it appears you have done-using a stake tied directly to the trunk. In doing so, you have prevented the trunks from developing strength via wind pushing them to and fro. They need that action to develop strength and trunk taper. When sticks are tied to young tree trunks-as soon as they are removed, the plant flops over.

Far better-if you must stake-to use two or three free-standing stakes and fasten to the tree from them-somewhat loosely-rather than that splint thing you've got going now.

I've emailed the nursery to double check. The stake is not directly with the trunk, it's offset by about 6-8" as I did see you want the tree to be able to move with the wind but not fall over. Id prefer to remove them all together so I'll wait to hear. They are a liberty and honey crisp apple and red have/reliance peaches

Nowadays I usually use tree tubes on bare root trees, and tie the tree tube to two stakes via zip ties.

OK-couldn't tell from the pic. Good show. Ed, how do you like those tubes? Don't know if this thread or another, but I said just today that despite being aware of those things for what....thirty years or more now, I still can't completely wrap my brain around why they are good for the trees. I get the herbivory protection part, sure, but does it not just get super-hot inside those tubes? I don't get it. Inquiring minds want to know!

I'm sort of conflicted on them...not sure if they do any good or not. My major use for them is to protect the trees planted in the lawn from the depredations of the wild lawnmower man. I'm planting at my parent's place, and there is always the risk the guy she hires to mow the lawn might confuse a recent bare root tree for a weed. A row of tall green tree tubes is actually somewhat more aesthetically pleasing then then a bunch of twigs of differing heights marked by orange stakes. The ones I use are green and ventilated, so I'm not sure they get too hot inside. I think they may provide some sun protection in the summer...of the two pitch pines that survived the drought, one was one of the ones I had in a tree tube. I think they did make that one a bit deformed, though. They are also a compromise solution to the "to stake or not to stake" question. I am a bit worried whether the sun loving, slower growing things get enough light in them.

I have no illusions they accelerate growth...I just hope they reduce the rate of mishaps with small bare root trees in a lawn.

I plan to surround mine with some paver flagstones to hold in the mulch so i don't think the mower or weed eater would be an issue....especially since i'll be the operator :)

Thanks Ed. Maybe some day we should do a survey on those things and see where everybody's at. Lord knows me and my sons plant enough trees-if it helped matters, we'd be able to profit by their use.

PSU, that sounds real good.

I think there are a whole bunch of different issues that have to be dealt with if you ever have anyone other then yourself do things in your yard. Maybe someone should do a thread on that...

I think if you are planting lots of trees in "acreage" then tree tubes probably aren't cost effective. If you are planting a couple trees outside your window in a small city lot they aren't necessary...you know where the trees are and can watch them. I think they are most useful for the intermediate case, where you are planting a bunch of trees in a big yard with rabbits or deer and sometimes hire landscapers to do things.

For what it's worth, my Lowes did sell special mesh rope for the purpose, but I didn't think it was cost effective.

I have 4 of them. Would you guys recommend anything other than a straight plant with mulch around it (not the trunk of course)

Oh yes, Edincoln...and believe me, during the initial few weeks after we got our ride-on, the attrition rates were desperate.

I have put poles up with flags tied on them because I plant my trees out as soon as I decently can get away with it (so tiny). Plant tubes though - I can't see how because my seedlings do not look like whips - in fact I seriously worried that I was causing them to be inadvertently bonsai'd. However, when potting them up from the 5 litre pots, the roots had a good run and were miles away from being rootbound or even slightly squeezed. Nonetheless though, they actually look like smaller versions of a large tree - you know, a proper branching system and a clear foretaste of their future shape and disposition. Will post some pics as I am very much a novice at growing trees from seed and I could be doing something horrendously wrong, although if they were perennials (much more familiar), I would be quite pleased with them - sturdy, well-proportioned, healthy little things with potential enclosed within...and in truth, all plants I raise at home never look like lush nursery-grown plants...although they all grow away when they get in the ground.

Oh yeah, if these are small mail order transplants I doubt you need to tie them up. You might. Maybe 1 of 10 of my trees have used staking.

Camp. you've got to quit pruning your young stock with the mower! Just kidding...what kinds of trees we talking?

what pic are you all talking about???

did OP answer what his soil type is???

in my sand.. anything under 3 feet.. NEVER needs a stake ... because the sand will hold it proper ...

a nebulous discussion could go on forever.. with little or no impact on OPs needs .. without facts ..

ken

I have very sandy soil. Had a Logan Labs test done (EC is 1.91) last year and i have added all the amendments recommended since to get the nutrients up to par (hopefully). I didn't post a pic but the trees are basically pruned back whips, pruned at 38" above the union.

PSU4ME: Sounds like you are doing everything right. Stakes probably aren't even necessary unless your area is very windy or they came without much in the way of roots to anchor them.

Campanula: Only thing you could do wrong that would result in more lower branches would be to top them. I think the tall whips are an artifact of bare-root shipping methods or growing lots of plants close together where they compete for sun. Or it could be the species.

I'm thinking just the opposite Ed. Not that Camp has done anything to account for this-it must be down to species characteristics, which you did say.. The vast majority of tree species-when reproducing naturally-occur as what we would call whips. You must have the ability in MA (right?) to see where a logging operation has happened perhaps five years previous. The tree saplings come up thicker than the hair on the proverbial dog...and they are all what non-tree folks would call "sticks". Of course they're not really sticks, that being something made out of a dead tree, lol. They've got buds, roots, all kinds of structures, but typically don't waste much energy on branching. That's why I was inquiring as to the species. That's a bit unusual to have lots of branches on very, very young trees. Of course, the old internet paradigm is in play here: She's in Britain and I'm responding from a desk in Wisconsin. It's inevitable for there to be some slippage of meaning.

Mine are on M7 and G202 rootstock. Does that make a difference in your opinion on staking?

Is your area windy?

it is not what i would consider windy. Does it get windy, it can but in general it isn't bad. I have the stake on the west side of the tree.

Thanks guys. I bought the trees from Cummins Nursery in NY and they said that since they are semidwarf rootstock, they should be staked for life due to the risk of breaking. To me, i think that could be tree if i'm going to push the tree to bear max fruit thus incurring all that wait.

Personally, i planted the trees to make an apple pie or two and to give the kids something to do/eat every now and then. This makes me less worried.

I think i'll do the knee highs on the apples for year 1 and then remove them. the peaches should be fine unstaked. I got the planted and packed nicely and with them being whips, i'm hard pressed to see any wind uprooting them.

Wow, never have I heard of that-leaving a tree staked for life! Well, you're on the right track. Happy pie-eating!

I am hoping the growth habits are species specific - I grow a number of rowans and they always make nice slender whips...as does laburnum, golden ash, gingko and betula albosinensis...but acer campestre, aesculus carnea, populus nigra, ulmus glabra, carpinus, spanish chestnut, all the redwoods, alder glutinosa, tilia cordata are all multibranched (never topped - gasp) while the pines are...well pines. Beech is still a single twig but looking set to branch this season (germinated last spring) too.

Since they get planted as soon as I can actually see them above the grass, they are not staked.

The nursery advice for very dwarfing fruit trees (M27) is for permanent staking here in the UK (although mine are on M9 which is fairly small and are not staked and even the cordons had their frames removed by year 5..

Offspring has gone to Venice and made off with my camera but pics will be provided as soon as possible for the perusal of those more expert than me (which is more or less everyone)

Tom and Edincoln - this is how I grow them. I sow 5 or so seeds to a 5litre pot in September/October and stratify naturally outside all winter. The first spring, they germinate and spend a whole year in the same pots although I thin them to my best seedling by autumn. Because of (lack of) irrigation, I usually have to maintain the saplings at home until their second year for an autumn planting (relying on a fast autumn root spurt and winter rains)...but by the first spring, I may transfer them into 15 litre pots. I don't bare-root them, just a gentle tip - they barely know they have been re-potted. So, the roots are not crowded but by the time they are going into the ground at 18months, many of them look just like tiny cute trees and nothing like the 2-3 foot maidens I buy from nurseries...although to be fair, I never buy 'trees' just 'hedging' unless it was a special thing like a Higan cherry or a particular malus.

Campanula: My theory is that if you grow them in a pot with full sun, they may not feel the need to shoot up towards the sun. If they grow in a field competing with brothers & sisters & weeds, they may try to get as tall as they can before branching. Nurseries that grow as many plants per acre as possible or want to ship the plants bare root may do the same thing. (accidentally or deliberately).

Redwood & pines are conifers, and they tend to do the pyramid branching thing when young. So the branches on them aren't unexpected. A bit surprised about the poplar.

Now I recall (better) Edincoln, seeds of black poplar are recalcitrant - only viable for a minuscule period of time so I propagated mine from basal shoots. Black poplars used to be a common tree in the UK but for some unknown (to me) reason, they have more or less vanished and are now rare - I had to search on a tree map to find one. Your explanation makes a lot of sense - thank you for putting my mind at rest - this tree lark is addictive though, hey? I have never grown pines before and have to say, that little pom-pom on top of a woody stem is unbearably cute. The lacebarks are lagging behind though - seem very slow indeed. The redwoods though - storming! My favourites, surprisingly, are the hornbeams.

Camp, I see no problem with anything you're doing. So long as a grower is not purposely malforming their young stock to make it look a certain way, no issues. And of course we're going to see variation across species.

Trees start out their lives with something called apical dominance. This consists of a chemical control of side buds-by chemicals produced in that apical bud at the tip of the plant. In effect, that growing tip hinders the expression of all others, for a time. In pine-family members and really, most conifers, this apical control is retained very long into the tree's life, hence the strongly excurrent growth form of most conifers. And you can see the opposite-the loss of this apical control-in very old pines, with their now-rounded tops. But they don't develop that until very far into maturity. Other tree groups more or less do the same. If it were not for this apical control, the title of this forum would be Groundcovers, lol!

Just wanted to jump in here and note that this thread represents what is great about the Trees forum: lots of great information exchanged in a friendly, meandering way. Carry on!

Campanula: I find planting conifers unforgiving. Lots of deciduous trees can grow back from the roots if they get hit by a mower...not pine. Particularly finicky about being planted at the right level.

One thing I should point out to you folks-I'm not parroting official nursery practice when I rail against some of their common methodology, like topping whips "to get them to branch". In truth, mine is a lonely voice in the wilderness on this issue, and pretty much nobody is listening! I can't get stock grown the way I like it.
Excepting for maybe some native plant nurseries, everybody tops their stuff, everybody tries to make a miniature version of a full-grown tree to put on the lot. Even spruce trees show up unnaturally pruned into a hard cone. This is all nonsense, but it is also all universal practice.

One time, back when Schmidt (giant Oregon wholesaler) would still sell directly to us, we got in a bunch of stock which was truly whips. Some of them were very tall, and a former city forester had one of the monkeys top each and every tree. Just took a loppers and made a random cut somewhere along those stems. Such idiocy.

<mortified> I always thought that hard cone shape was the natural shape of young spruce. Do they recover from the pruning?

Oh sure they do, but there is an awkward period, half one way, half the other. Now Ed, spruce and fir are indeed conical in growth form. What I'm referring to is hard shearing-like they do for Christmas trees-but transposed to those plants intended for landscape use. Look closely next time-it's easy to see all the branch tips are cut off.

Again-they will recover...again-they will look stupid for a while....and again, none of this is necessary.

Speaking of conifers with awkward adolescences...I've come to suspect there is an issue like that with white pine in suburbia. When they are young they are cute little Christmas trees. When you see really old ones in the woods or old farm fence lines they are majestic. I think there is a awkward phase in between where they can't decide whether they need to drop their lower branches, their lower branches start to die, some fall off. Usually in suburbia someone either decides they are dying or gets worried about branches falling on their house. If they would just wait it out another 80 years...

Ha ha - yep, we replanted our christmas trees - Norway spruce, serbian Spruce...and the following 3 years they looked...ridiculous - mad branching at the ends of the branches (growth follows the knife) looking like demented pom-pom crazed cheerleaders.