Screening trees which can be limbed up, zone 5?
Christine M.
7 years ago
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Christine M.
7 years agoken_adrian Adrian MI cold Z5
7 years agoRelated Discussions
tall screening bamboo for zone 5
Comments (7)The ultimate size attained by Yellow Groove (Phyllostachys aureus) depends on your zone and other climatic factors (light, rainfall, soil, etc). So the sizes that you see given for these species are not necessarily exagerations. Also, keep in mind that it may take a several years for the groove to get established. Lewis Bamboo (boo nursery in Alabama) gives the following as an approximate guide to eventual heights depending on zone: Zone 4 (8 feet) zone 5 (12-14 feet) zone 6 (18 feet) zone 7 (40 feet+) Sometimes posters make general statements about the performance of species in their own backyards without realizing how different the same plant may behave in another area. PS.: In my area, I would never plant P. aureus in the ground without serious attention to rhizome control (speaking from personal experience here)....See MoreHow do you hybridize trees zone 4-5 to zone 3?
Comments (7)>>I wonder If I graft the japanese maple onto a regular hardy maple in my climate?Grafting I'll use the example of roses here. Just like japanese maples, most roses are not hardy to zones 4 and lower. The are zone 5 and up. Hybrid tea for instance are not hardy but they are grafted onto hardy roots. Unfortuntely, this doesn't make them hardy in zone 4 and down, we have to protect them heavily so they will come back the year after and even then you run the risk of loosing them. Not because the root system is in danger but because the grafted part is. But even if you loose the grafted part during the winter, you still may have roses that will emerge from the root stock, below the grafting point. Of course, they wont be the same hybrid tea that you bought since that part died, but a hardy rose from the plant on which it was grafted. I would say the same rules would apply to japanese maples grafted onto hardy maple roots. You probably know the Explorer Serie roses. These roses are hybrids but are not grafted, they use their own roots to grow from and they are hardy to zone 3 and some to zone 2. I have 5 of them doing very well and they never needed any kind of winter protection and I never even thought about giving them any either (zone 4b QC, Canada). Why is this? The crosses were made between hardy species and/or cultivar from the the start and the breeding was done not to impart hardiness in the first place but to develop other caracteristics such as colors, trailing habits, short plants, diseases resistantce, etc. They probably used less hardy roses in their breeding program to bring in some new genes unvailable otherwise. Hybridizing If you cross two zone 5 plants like two acer palmatum, you'll end up with a bunch of other zone 5 plants. But if you cross a zone 2 plant with a zone 4 plant, you will probably end up with 80% of the plants hardy to zone 3, 10% hardy to zone 4 and 10% hardy to zone 2. Then if you take one of these new zone 3 hardy plant, roses for example and cross it back with a zone 2 rose, you may end up with a 50% zone 3 and 50% zone 2 stock. And if you cross back again one of these new zone 3 rose with a zone 2 rose, you may end up with a 75% zone 2 - 25% zone 3 ratio. These same rules would also apply to maples making crosses between 2 different species, one of them being the japanese maple for the first cross. The difference is here: in the example of roses I took, the desirable plant and the one used in every cross was a zone 2 and the goal was to bring a zone 4 plant to zone 2. With every cross I did I added some zone 2 hardiness to the gene pool. With the japanese maple, we would be working against the odds, the desirable plant and the one that should be used in every cross is a zone 5 plant and that would bring a zone 3 plant to a zone 5 only. And if I added more and more zone 3 maple, I would be loosing more and more of the japanese gene pool. Either way leads you away from the wanted result. And we haven't even said a word about what could be recessive of dominant in these crosses, which is also a very important factor to keep in mind. This can be observed in the new clematis hybrids that are reaching the market these years. Old clematis were hardy in zone 4, but crossing them to warmer growing one has yielded many new very desirable hybrids, but only hardy in zone 5, 6 or even 7. We have gained in beauty but lost in hardiness. In a word I don't think grafting would be successfull in the way you would want it to be. And breeding wouldn't work quite the way you would want either from what I understand from what you said. These are two of the reasons why I said that selection was a much better approach in your case. It is not an easier or shorter one way to do, only a safer one. Hope this helps!...See More5 Different Trees and Bushes recommendations NJ zone 6-7
Comments (8)thanks for the recs, I coulda just googled the usda hardiness zone and found many options but I know for example like dogwoods are recently not doing to well in this zone (something with a beatle or something like that) but I will search each type further. Now I think I'm going to actually just plant like 7 different types of trees in between the arboorvitaes! Sounds wrong but I have seen many examples of similar, and it looks cool, also what's good is that for example arborvites sometimes can get snow damaged (limbs break under weight) and if you have a 20 year old screen of them and one gets beat up, you might want to replace it and might be hard to find the exact type and especially size and could be pricey. With using different types, if something dies or gets beat up it can just be replaced. I think I'll try an aprocot tree (have seen one doing well in the area) and a few other evergreen columnars/semi columnar....See MoreHelp Planting a Tree Screen in Zone 6a (Ohio)
Comments (10)Sorry for the small image! I will attach one with larger font below: Thank you Ken and Lane for the advice. To Lane -- I will reconsider my choice of blue spruce based on the humidity in our region. I do plan to cut down a lot of the hybrid poplar and willow stuff as it grows and as the more sturdy evergreen trees grow taller. To Ken -- I love oak trees, but I don't want more trees that are close to the house, and I mostly want to stick with evergreens as I love year round color and not dealing with leaves. I would consider planting them further from the house though. As for the soil, there is definitely a lot of clay (we are actually near Westerville) but I'm hoping that all the excavation will loosen some of the top soil. Also, I am fine with the planting ending up being a bunch of tall trees -- in fact, that's what I prefer. Basically, in 20 years (we hope for this to be our forever home) I would love to look out our front door and practically see a forest of mostly evergreen trees separating us from the road. I just want to make sure that I do it in a way that ends up crowded in a good way as quickly as possible without hurting the trees. I too worry about the lifespan and strength of "fast growing" trees, but I do prefer to have at least part of this planting growing as quickly as possible. So my thinking was to mix in 3 different species of these fast growing trees so that I don't have to worry about losing them all at once to disease, and surround them with better long-term trees so that as they die/loose limbs, I'll still be left with a little mini forest of evergreen trees. I hope this helps give a little more detail into what I am looking to do. I am definitely open to different species than the ones listed above, and I am fine with planting further apart if I can still achieve a dense, forest-like area in the future....See Morewisconsitom
7 years agoChristine M.
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7 years agoToronado3800 Zone 6 St Louis
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7 years agolast modified: 7 years agocorkball (z9 FL)
7 years agoSelect Landscapes of Iowa
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7 years agoChristine M.
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