Planting Small Christmas Tree Seedlings in a Transplant Bed
Hey guys welcome back to Woods Tree Farm I'm Phil and today we're gonna do a Proper transplant bed we've actually Never done this before we've always just Field planted everything that we've ever Planted but this year last year it would Take a step back we got hit pretty hard With a dry fall and then over the winter Deer took out a bunch of trees and we Had a lot of browse damage on our White Pines we had a bunch of rub damage on Our Scotch Pines and also on some of our Lelands so we did a big order from the Forestry Department and their seedlings Were just two o's so we got some Scotch Pine and some white pine from them and Many of their seedlings just weren't Strong enough to stand up on their own So we're going to Plant in a transplant bed all the Smallest ones all the largest ones we Have field planted if they were big Enough to stand up on their own we have Filled in here in our field with those Little 2o seedlings and like I said all The rest are going to go in a transplant That so we've identified a spot which is Just over here this will get afternoon Shade so hopefully that you know Preserves some moisture in the soil for These seedlings it's also right here Next to the pond where it'll be easy for Us to just scoop up a bucket of water as Needed to water the seedlings in the
Transplant bed and uh what I've done so Far here is just a turn over this little Bit of soil right here I use the blue Tractor and the plow on the back of that Now we're going to go hook up the tiller On the other tractor try to break up the Soil we're going to add some wood chips We've got a pile broken down wood chips That have been over there over two years So it's mostly just you know decomposed Wood chips that's almost turned into a Topsoil like material we'll take a look At that in a minute but we're going to Add some of that to this and then we're Going to create a little bit of a mound And it will be our transplant bed and Then we'll put some trees in it so Enough talking about it let's get to Work so we got the tiller hooked onto The back of the tractor and while I was Away doing that the kid let's grab the Metal detector and started treating this As a little archaeological site and Found a tiny Little Unfired Bullet uh and Hudson could read it I Couldn't see it but it says uh S and W 32. So that is interesting oh so you know What this actually it has a little Mark On that center pin I don't know if you Guys will be able to see that See a little Mark in the middle of that
Center pin so they tried to fire it and It didn't fire so then they ejected it Left it on the ground for you to find And went about their day that happens Sometimes when you're shooting a gun not Every bullet will go off and that looks Like that's what happened with that you Find anything That thing's a little tall for you yeah Yeah do you have the sensitivity dialed Up or down or in the middle Hudson do you know Default sensitivity now it's not all Right You need to move your there you go let's Say get that parallel to the ground did You see something you hear something Over here We stopped just over there Yeah after I finish this out Yeah All the way over and back over and back All right the archeology team is Clearing out they're going to move on to Another site to go explore and now we Can get to work on this transplant bed There you can see these uh these wood Chips that have been over here have Largely turned into soil there's Obviously still some undecomposed stuff In there but I think this will be good For our clay soil we've done this Elsewhere in our property and I think it Helps so uh I'm just going to kind of
Knock this pile down now we'll sprinkle Some fertilizer in here with it and turn All this up with the tiller Foreign Thank you Foreign Okay this really looks pretty good I'm pretty pleased with the way this Came out look at that there's our Nemesis right there we have lots of These grubs that we're going to be Treating for this year and Um you know we got to wait until they're Actively feeding when they're a little Bit higher up in the soil but uh we have Definitely lost some trees in the past To those grubs and we want to get that Under control but hopefully these trees In this transplant bed will do good Stacy's coming now I can hear her coming She has some trees Oh that'll work nice You know we've got a flat trenching Shovel that would work better than that Carp one no that card All right so you're gonna take that Rubber band off and let's just get like I don't know six or eight trees and try To make a little row of them You know do a little something like that Does it need to be deeper Thank you All right what do you think Stace I Think it looks great
Looks cute Fluffy Hope it works It's a lot of trees There's more trees in there than I Thought we had but I it really makes Sense to not put some of those small Trees in the field we've done that in Past years and 100 of them uh die for Some reason Um more often than not in the past it's You can't see it with the mo when you're Mowing and you just chop it off but they Also just dry up and you know they they Need to be staked and all that but I Told you we were going I was going to Show you some of the deer damage that We've had it has been extensive so right In this area in here with these lelands All this brown you see all these trees Had been rubbed we got one there it's Completely knocked over we need to stand It up got another one over here that's Partially knocked over so this little Section of Leland's right here got hit Really hard and Um hoping to you know some of these Trees will bounce back we'll just have To wait and see those were just the Lelands and then a number of the Surviving White Pines that we had out Here were eaten down to just little Nubs I've already dug those up and put some New Pines in so I can't show you those
We did have a couple of our surviving Furs and there aren't many surviving Furs on this property but a couple of Those also got rubbed which is really Disappointing because we really want to Grow first and we haven't had that many Survive and when you see an otherwise Healthy fur get completely destroyed by Deer it's a little disheartening but I Guess that's just part of the battle and There are sprays that we could explore To repel deer I've heard uh mixed Feedback from different Farmers on some Of those so that could be something we Could explore or we could just you know Up the number of trees that we're Planting which I think is the approach That many farmers take is just you know You expect that the deer can't rub them All can't eat them all just plant two or Three times the number of trees you Think you're going to need and expect That a number of them are going to get Damaged or die for some reason or Another along the way All right we'll keep you posted on the Transplant bed as we get through the Summer this year we're hoping that this Is going to be easier to water this Would be easier to maintain it's going To be easier to weed so give it really Giving these trees a good chance at Surviving to become bigger and then we Can move them into the field once they
Can stand up for themselves which might Be as soon as next year was going to Have to kind of wait and see so we'll Keep you posted on future video how That's going and we're going to wrap it Up for today thanks for watching we Appreciate you we'll see on the next Video bye-bye
