Another hackberry repot!

[amethystearth]

This isn't my tree, but I make a lot of styling and care decisions on it for my brother. This tree was growing sluggish due to poor soil (still had native soil from collection when purchased). We found a wider trunk after the repot which is a nice plus for this tree. We also removed a dead aerial root that was honestly just making the trunk look smaller. Going for a literati/flatop style here. It's a wild tree.

Also, we decided to guy wire part of the canopy lower to give it a flatter look (if you can't tell, in the before pic the canopy is a bit slanted). The front is a bit messier as a result, but the tree no longer totally lopsided from the back. I planned for a little bounce back when we remove the wire (they grow fast so it wont have to be on long) and that should help make the branches more distinguishable from all sides.

Comments/criticism always welcome. Thanks for taking a look


edit: added a picture

 

[jeremy_norbury]

Very nice.

 

[amethystearth]

Very nice.

fancy seeing you here, stranger

I thought about making a new acct with my real name but IDK, I've already posted a few things on this one and I already gave them my throwaway acct :[

 

[edprocoat]

Amethys* it looks as if you removed about 8 exposed roots. That had to be a bunch of the root mass judging by the pot compared to the tree height. Have you did this much root work on one of these before? I wonder how it will handle that or if maybe its like an elm and will not be bothered.

ed

 

[amethystearth]

Amethys* it looks as if you removed about 8 exposed roots. That had to be a bunch of the root mass judging by the pot compared to the tree height. Have you did this much root work on one of these before? I wonder how it will handle that or if maybe its like an elm and will not be bothered.

ed

Ed, Feel free to call me jeremy if you want. Rest assured those roots were not all removed at once. I also did not defoliate the tree- the before picture is from a year ago when it was breaking leaf. We found the smaller roots to have little to none root mass attached to them. We recently removed the largest and final aerial root during the repot when we found it was dead and no roots were attached to it. It peeled off it had been dead so long. The larger base we found under the soil had all the root mass coming from it. We actually didn't root prune this one beyond removing 3 larger roots that had almost no fine roots on them. Probably about 5% total root mass removed. That being said, a healthy hackberry can tolerate massive root pruning and can even root hardwood cuttings of decent size with ease. This tree was not growing vigorously so we opted out of root pruning (plus it had space to grow- the previous soil was limiting how many fine roots it could put out I imagine)

Thanks for the concern

 

[edprocoat]

Ed, Feel free to call me jeremy if you want. Rest assured those roots were not all removed at once. I also did not defoliate the tree- the before picture is from a year ago when it was breaking leaf. We found the smaller roots to have little to none root mass attached to them. We recently removed the largest and final aerial root during the repot when we found it was dead and no roots were attached to it. It peeled off it had been dead so long. The larger base we found under the soil had all the root mass coming from it. We actually didn't root prune this one beyond removing 3 larger roots that had almost no fine roots on them. Probably about 5% total root mass removed. That being said, a healthy hackberry can tolerate massive root pruning and can even root hardwood cuttings of decent size with ease. This tree was not growing vigorously so we opted out of root pruning (plus it had space to grow- the previous soil was limiting how many fine roots it could put out I imagine)

Thanks for the concern

Ok then Jeremy if you want ! I did not know it was a year since the first picture. Sounds like you have it under control, I seen where you said it was growing sluggish and feared with those roots removed at one time time it would be the burn pile for this one, and that would have been a shame as it is a nice looking Literati IMO.

ed

 

[amethystearth]

Ok then Jeremy if you want ! I did not know it was a year since the first picture. Sounds like you have it under control, I seen where you said it was growing sluggish and feared with those roots removed at one time time it would be the burn pile for this one, and that would have been a shame as it is a nice looking Literati IMO.

ed

I can see how that'd raise concern. I didn't make it clear in the photos how much time had passed. Thanks for the kind words, I think the tree is turning out nice. We are very pleased with it