So many questions...Bristlecone, Sequoia, Black Pine

Leo in N E Illinois

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keep a plastic pot of around the same size or bigger to slip pot later if need be. Better safe than sorry

There is no such thing as a ''gentle slip pot''. Even slip potting into a different container will disturb the roots. Disturbing the roots of bristlecone pine less than 12 months from the previous disturbance is the ''kiss of death''. I try to let my JWP go 5 years between repotting if possible, the less often you disturb roots the better, especially with short growing season, high elevation pines. I never kept a bristlecone alive for more than 2 years, they are very touchy.
 

Underdog

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Just a thanks to Leo for this great stuff. I too have some JBP for the 6yr contest freezing right now as I read zone 5. Also some tiny bristelcone seedlings and black spruce to winter. Great thread.
 

mikejungle

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finally home.
species names:
sequoiadendrum giganteum (a?)
pinus aristata
pinus thunbergii

just wanted to write out the sequoia to solidify it in my noggin.

Garaging
My garage only sees light when I come in from a Costco run. Every 2 weeks or so. 0soyoung's input makes me think this is not a bad thing, but is it sufficient, or should I open the door more often?
And to sum up what I think I've learned: Aristata and Giganteum will be going into the garage, maybe closer to the house, depending on how temperature reads. If temperature does start to get close to 23 F, what should I do? Space heater or move indoors until the weather passes?
Still not sure where to put Thunbergii. I'd like to garage it too, but sounds like I might need to bring it indoors if it gets colder than maybe...28 F? If you have a better number or protocol, please let me know.

Water
I used Pur filtered tap water, because I figured it would be relatively harmless until I learned whether to use filtered or straight tap water. It sounds like I can just use the tap water, correct?
I'm not sure what to make of your comments about well water, Leo. Where would I even get well water? I've only been in the area for a year now (California, previously), so I'm not familiar with this.

Is there any way to know for sure whether the drainage, is adequate?
I guess I can adjust my protocol for each pot as I go along, but it was surprising to see how much water I had to pour into the 2 gallon pots before they started draining from the bottom. I'd say they flowed pretty readily, even the two with the cactus soil mixed in, but I'm just not confident yet with these bigger pots, and am paranoid about over-watering.
I've had a Juniper Mallsai from Mitsuwa, and due to its tiny pot, water flowed readily from the bottom, and it looks great so far.
I'll take your finger-digging tip, but if you've got any more, I'm all ears.
Also, I don't trust myself to gauge the weight of the pot yet. I'm super strong, so anything under 100 lbs. all feels the same to me.
Jk about my strength, but I don't know if I'd be able to differentiate.


pinus aristata
Kinda bummed to hear that the pinus aristata is going to be so hard just to keep alive. If I can sum it up, it sounds like the summer months in Chicago are the potential killers? Any chance that a controlled environment indoors with a fan and a, "sunlight", bulb next to the window sill will be better than leaving it outside?

And your latest comment about the jostling...does that mean that any watering needs to take place wherever i put it down next? I didn't know it was so sensitive, so I watered it in the tub, and moved it again earlier this afternoon.

pinus thunbergii
Jonsteen's (the company I got the seedlings from), called it a JBP.

Incidentally, I'm going to S. Korea in a week, so if I find any seedlings, it sounds like they might do better in Chicago?
Never tried this before, so if anyone's done it, I'd appreciate tips.


Thanks again for the continued info; I found it pretty hard to find info about aristata before buying, but I just thought it was such a badass tree, I had to try.
 

Dav4

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The bristlecone and sequoia are cold hardy, which means that once they are dormant you can place them in a dark place like your garage. Or you could place them in a window well, or just find a spot to mulch in their pots in your yard. The important thing is to never let them dry out. They won't be using any water, but the roots can't dry.

The Japanese black pine I don't think will go fully dormant. I'd like to hear someone else up north share their experiences, but if it were my tree I would leave it outside until it started to drop below freezing at night, and then move it indoors into a sunny window. I don't think they will survive a long period of winter dormancy with extended below freezing temps.
I kept JBP in zone 6 MA for many years back when we actually had cold winters. My jbp did just fine kept outside and mulched into the north side of a short hill, in frozen soil from the end of December until late March or even April, with winter lows below zero for several nights and more then a few weeks where it didn't get above 32F. I grew them in the ground for years without issue, too. With that being said, I wouldn't keep a JBP in or near Chicago without having serious winter protection for the tree. I think a garage would work well if it stays consistently COLD through the winter... you don't want candles extending on your pine in late February or March.
 

LeeInBama

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Hello from Bama, Mike. Just wanted to say that you’re getting advice from some very good sources. The main reason I’m posting is because you have a bristlecone pine tree. To me that’s awesome because I’ve seen one in Oregon on or around one of the three sisters mountains. It was purportedly over 900 years old. Pretty cool. Good luck with it and please update with pics!
 

mikejungle

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Hello Lee.

What kind of cold protection would work for the JBP? The garage is surrounded by CMU's, so it's a decent insulator, but I'm not sure what to do, yet.

Also, where can I get more resources for the aristata? It seems like the most fragile, given my region.
 

Potawatomi13

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The Japanese black pine I don't think will go fully dormant. I'd like to hear someone else up north share their experiences, but if it were my tree I would leave it outside until it started to drop below freezing at night, and then move it indoors into a sunny window. I don't think they will survive a long period of winter dormancy with extended below freezing temps.

Several JBP here and all left fully exposed on bench to snow, days of Ice hanging on trees, low 20s and teens for days and have all done fine;). However none just repotted!
 

Potawatomi13

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Pinus aristata
Kinda bummed to hear that the pinus aristata is going to be so hard just to keep alive. If I can sum it up, it sounds like the summer months in Chicago are the potential killers? Any chance that a controlled environment indoors with a fan and a, "sunlight", bulb next to the window sill will be better than leaving it outside?

And your latest comment about the jostling...does that mean that any watering needs to take place wherever i put it down next? I didn't know it was so sensitive, so I watered it in the tub, and moved it again earlier this afternoon.

Not necessarily true! As for keeping indoors: NOT A CHANCE! If soil drains well regular H2O in warm weather no problem. Not on foliage! Sun is good but as for most trees not near hot reflecting surface. Have one since 1995 doing great. Is pictured in BCP thread this site;). Hope these survive for you.
 

Leo in N E Illinois

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Hey Mike - sorry, not trying to make trees sound more delicate than they are.

Jostling - root hairs are the ''engine'', the business end of a root. The root hairs and the short little meristematic region at the tip of a root do 90 % of the water and nutrient absorption. The longer, more mature linear sections of the root do only about 10% of the water absorption. These very tiny, soft growing ends of the roots are easy to break if the tree shifts in its media. This is the part that gets damaged when ''slip potting'' or gentle repotting, and because they are so tiny, you don't see them getting damaged. You think you didn't hurt the tree because the straight lengths of the roots were not damaged, but the tiny, brittle tips get damaged. That is why I routinely rant and rave against thinking ''slip potting'' doesn't count as the disturbance that a full blown repotting with roots work counts as. But trees in nature stand up to all kinds of disturbance above ground. When you put wire on the tree, one tends to flex the trunk, pushing and pulling that moves the entire trunk down into the roots. THis is rough on a freshly repotted tree. The jostling warning was really about the pulling and bending that goes into wiring. Not routine watering.

Watering a tree will not jostle the roots, unless you drop it moving from the shelf to the sink or bucket or however you do it. Don't worry about jostling when you water. The trees are tough enough,, it won't be a problem. Relax, don't worry. Just bumping the tree with your arm or hand is no big deal either. Relax, if you saw me around my trees you would think - ''bull, meet china shop''. I don't kick my pots of trees (well not often) but I am not unusually gentle.

With the coarse open mixes, one really needs to flood a pot to get all the media in the pot wet. Outdoors, this is easy with a garden hose. Indoors, is another matter. I usually walk around with a 3 or 5 gallon bucket and large dish pan, dunk each pot in to the rim, or where I see water coming up from the bottom through the media surface. Then I'll set the tree in the dish pan to finish draining excess water, then back on the shelf. One advantage of the bucket system is that once the growing season has returned the water can also have your favorite soluble fertilizer, be it inorganic, or fish emulsion or kelp extract or humic acid extract. But right now that is not an issue.

A mix is good if water pours through quick enough that it is difficult to get water to puddle on top. That is good drainage.
 

Leo in N E Illinois

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finally home.
species names:
sequoiadendrum giganteum (a?)
pinus aristata
pinus thunbergii

just wanted to write out the sequoia to solidify it in my noggin.
Great! you now have the names, you don't have to guess, and when asking others, you can get better advice. Maybe this is a little ''too deep'' but the name Sequoiadendron giganteum is the current correct name, botanical latin requires the species name to agree with the gender of the Genus name. Sequoiadendron is neuter, so giganteum is the neuter form of the latin for gigantic. Half a century ago, there was no genus Sequoiadendron, the giant Sequoia was placed in the same genus as the Coast Redwood, Sequoia, which is a feminine in Latin. So the feminine form of gigantic is gigantea. The species name had to be modified when it was moved to a different Genus with a different gender. - eh gads, I did waste time typing this! Nobody needs to know this unless they are a taxonomist. There must be something wrong with me.

Garaging
My garage only sees light when I come in from a Costco run. Every 2 weeks or so. 0soyoung's input makes me think this is not a bad thing, but is it sufficient, or should I open the door more often?
The main decision door open or closed should be made from temperature.

And to sum up what I think I've learned: Aristata and Giganteum will be going into the garage, maybe closer to the house, depending on how temperature reads. If temperature does start to get close to 23 F, what should I do? Space heater or move indoors until the weather passes?
Still not sure where to put Thunbergii. I'd like to garage it too, but sounds like I might need to bring it indoors if it gets colder than maybe...28 F? If you have a better number or protocol, please let me know.

All three should be in the garage. JBP too. They need the cold rest. 23 F? That is an arbitrary number chosen because the trees were just repotted. If the trees were repotted early enough to have 2 or 3 months to re-establish root systems, they could take significantly colder temperatures. Do not bring any of them indoors UNLESS you can keep them colder than 40 F for the time they are indoors. Most homes do not have a space like this.

It would be better to put a space heater in the garage to keep the temps somewhere in the 20 F to 40 F range. Try not to let it get warmer than 40 F or colder than 20 F. This hassle is the reason it is usually recommended to not repot just before winter. You need at least 8 weeks, preferably 12 or 16 weeks for the tree to recover.

Those of us who do autumn repotting have a space like I do. I have an old well house that never drops below 32 F and is always under 40 F except for the last 2 weeks before normal last frost. Many others have greenhouses that they keep cool, but above freezing.

Water
I used Pur filtered tap water, because I figured it would be relatively harmless until I learned whether to use filtered or straight tap water. It sounds like I can just use the tap water, correct?
I'm not sure what to make of your comments about well water, Leo. Where would I even get well water? I've only been in the area for a year now (California, previously), so I'm not familiar with this.

If you live east of Highway 83, Elmhurst Road, you are probably on 100% Lake Michigan water for your municipal water supply. Great to use water straight from the tap, no need to filter it.

If you live west of Highway 83, Elmhurst Road, call your local village water department and ask whether you are on a municipal well system, Lake Michigan water, or a blended water supply? That is the reason I mentioned well water, the suburbs within 15 to 20 miles of Lake Michigan are usually on Lake Michigan water. Western suburbs is mixed, and most suburbs west of Highway 53 or Interstate 355 are on municipal wells. There are water districts, where municipalities pool together to get their water supply, so the water sources in the west suburbs are a patchwork of being either on large municipal wells or on a water main supplying water from Lake Michigan. I raise orchids also, and it was for the more sensitive orchids that I went through the trouble of learning about water supply.

So, is your village on Lake Michigan water or a municipal well?

I've had a Juniper Mallsai from Mitsuwa, and due to its tiny pot, water flowed readily from the bottom, and it looks great so far.

Great, the juniper should be fine.
Mitsuwa is quite the place. I love shopping there, but it is a bit too far to drive for weekly grocery shopping. The ''food court'' is a great place for lunch, I hit it when I can, maybe 3 or 4 times a year.

I'll take your finger-digging tip, but if you've got any more, I'm all ears.
Also, I don't trust myself to gauge the weight of the pot yet. I'm super strong, so anything under 100 lbs. all feels the same to me.
Jk about my strength, but I don't know if I'd be able to differentiate.
Glad to help. I use the bamboo skewer method myself too. I used my finger to figure out what the color change means.

pinus aristata
Kinda bummed to hear that the pinus aristata is going to be so hard just to keep alive. If I can sum it up, it sounds like the summer months in Chicago are the potential killers? Any chance that a controlled environment indoors with a fan and a, "sunlight", bulb next to the window sill will be better than leaving it outside?

No chance an indoor environment would work. Sorry. I raise orchids, used to have over 1300 orchids under lights, right now I'm down to maybe 800. I have a serious under lights set up in my basement, my entire basement. I have tried to raise JBP under lights. Even in the brightest spot under my 1000 watt HPS lamps the growth of the JBP was inferior to growth outdoors in full sun. I ended up having to prune off any growth I got over the winter sometime over the summer. 2 steps forward, 3 steps backward. This was with low elevation JBP. The bristlecone is adapted to living above 10,000 feet. The air is so thin up there that the sunlight is nearly double the intensity of sun at sea level. At sea level full sun is about 10,000 foot candles of light, at 10,000 feet elevation, the sun is nearly 20,000 foot candles of light, seriously more intense. You would need triple or quadruple the lights needed for a good marijuana crop to get acceptable growth on a bristlecone. And then you would have the issue of getting rid of the heat from that many lights. It ain't gonna work, and certainly won't work if one has to do it on a budget.

Bristlecones are extreme environment plants. As much as I love them, or the idea of having one for bonsai, I got to accept I can't grow them at all. It thrives on extreme cold in winter, and wants a cool to cold summer that you would need to be on the north shore of Lake Superior or back in Colorado above 7000 feet to supply. The only reason that this year I recommended shelter in the garage is because of the fresh repotting. Otherwise it needs to be out in the cold.

Now you might get lucky. It might pull through a summer or two for you. If it does - great. I just don't expect it last long term.

Leo
 

Vance Wood

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Hey Mike - sorry, not trying to make trees sound more delicate than they are.

Jostling - root hairs are the ''engine'', the business end of a root. The root hairs and the short little meristematic region at the tip of a root do 90 % of the water and nutrient absorption. The longer, more mature linear sections of the root do only about 10% of the water absorption. These very tiny, soft growing ends of the roots are easy to break if the tree shifts in its media. This is the part that gets damaged when ''slip potting'' or gentle repotting, and because they are so tiny, you don't see them getting damaged. You think you didn't hurt the tree because the straight lengths of the roots were not damaged, but the tiny, brittle tips get damaged. That is why I routinely rant and rave against thinking ''slip potting'' doesn't count as the disturbance that a full blown repotting with roots work counts as. But trees in nature stand up to all kinds of disturbance above ground. When you put wire on the tree, one tends to flex the trunk, pushing and pulling that moves the entire trunk down into the roots. THis is rough on a freshly repotted tree. The jostling warning was really about the pulling and bending that goes into wiring. Not routine watering.

Watering a tree will not jostle the roots, unless you drop it moving from the shelf to the sink or bucket or however you do it. Don't worry about jostling when you water. The trees are tough enough,, it won't be a problem. Relax, don't worry. Just bumping the tree with your arm or hand is no big deal either. Relax, if you saw me around my trees you would think - ''bull, meet china shop''. I don't kick my pots of trees (well not often) but I am not unusually gentle.

With the coarse open mixes, one really needs to flood a pot to get all the media in the pot wet. Outdoors, this is easy with a garden hose. Indoors, is another matter. I usually walk around with a 3 or 5 gallon bucket and large dish pan, dunk each pot in to the rim, or where I see water coming up from the bottom through the media surface. Then I'll set the tree in the dish pan to finish draining excess water, then back on the shelf. One advantage of the bucket system is that once the growing season has returned the water can also have your favorite soluble fertilizer, be it inorganic, or fish emulsion or kelp extract or humic acid extract. But right now that is not an issue.

A mix is good if water pours through quick enough that it is difficult to get water to puddle on top. That is good drainage.

Not wishing to create a controversy but your parameter: A mix is good if water pours through quick enough that it is difficult to get water to puddle on top. That is good drainage. This does not take into account that sometimes water can run around the edges and by-pass the middle of the soil mass altogether, especially if the two elements of the soil in a pot are significantly different in content and structure. This kind of condition can deceive you into believing that everything is OK. when it is not. It is only when the tree starts looking bad that you start asking questions.
 

Potawatomi13

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Is any consideration given to climatic zone where Bristlecones live in present discussion:confused:?
 

Jzack605

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The bristlecone and sequoia are cold hardy, which means that once they are dormant you can place them in a dark place like your garage. Or you could place them in a window well, or just find a spot to mulch in their pots in your yard. The important thing is to never let them dry out. They won't be using any water, but the roots can't dry.

The Japanese black pine I don't think will go fully dormant. I'd like to hear someone else up north share their experiences, but if it were my tree I would leave it outside until it started to drop below freezing at night, and then move it indoors into a sunny window. I don't think they will survive a long period of winter dormancy with extended below freezing temps.
Japanese Black Pine grow well in my zone, 7 and are labeled to be hardy to zone 6. We have a few amazing specimens down the street from me that I have been meaning to share photos of. Some distribution maps do include Chicago but the actual zone being 5b is definitely pushing it with no winter protection.
 

robert gardner

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First of all, I seriously wish I lived in a cooler place so I could have a bristlecone pine. Second of all, I wish bristlecone pines/seeds were available on my side of the planet.
Bristlecone seeds as well of many other varieties of conifers are sold at SHEFIELDS SEEDS.
 

robert gardner

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@mikejungle
Welcome to BNut, if you stick with through the first few disasters that we all had when we started, you will have started a great, life long hobby.

I live in Zion, just north of Waukegan, east of Gurnee, so I am probably less than 20 miles from you. I don't want to be ''Debbie Downer'' but your trees have a less than auspicious chance of getting through this winter. As Peter Tea said to me and the rest of the AAC, ''if Californians had to do what we have to do to get through our winters, nobody in California would raise bonsai". The Chicagoland climate is brutal.

But I will help you the best I can to figure out something to give your trees a the best chance of survival. Each of your trees have fairly different growth habits. But all need a winter dormancy. A key point, that took me years to finally believe it is a ''good enough to be useful approximation'' is that if you keep the temperature below 40 F, for all intents and purposes the metabolism of the trees is so slow that they can be stored in the dark. Believe me, it is true. Your pines and sequoia will be fine if you put them in the garage if you can keep the garage below 40 F. At this point a cheap thermometer is a good investment. Put it next to your trees. Jot down your temperatures so you don't forget. Check mid day, to see the high temp and late night or early morning to see the low. Even if this batch of trees perish, the temperature data will help you next year when trying to figure out where to keep your trees. Also be concious that the outside wall will be colder than the wall against the house. Get data on both areas, choose the one that stays below 40 F. Because you repotted so recently the garage is the only option. Next year the bristlecone should be outside, and sequoia will need the garage. We'll talk about the black pine, but probably it will need the garage.

Perfect storage temperature would be below 40 F and for freshly repotted trees above 28 F. Above 32 would be ideal, but as long as you keep the garage above 23 F all winter they should all be okay even though they were freshly repotted.

Soil - from the sounds of it, your soil mix basically is good. You got the idea. I would have skipped the cactus mix for the bristlecone pine, but this is not a serious issue. I would not change it. The sifting to remove fines is the key to making any potting mix perform better.

IF at all possible, do not repot any of the trees for 2 growing seasons. They need to get some growth and recovery time. Bare root shipping an repotting is quite traumatic. Contact me via PM (private message through BNut) and I will make sure you get some inexpensive pumice & other ingredients to add to your potting mixes in the future.

Watering - the best water meter is the human finger. Dig in at least the full depth of your fingernail, use this to ''calibrate'' the bamboo skewer system by comparing to the look of the skewer. If your plant collection is small, just hefting the pots you will know by the weight whether they are wet or dry. Use your finger to calibrate your sense of heft. After some experience, just tilting the pot a little, the weight will let you know where you are at. Water quality of Chicagoland ''Lake Michigan'' tap water is excellent, good for most species, most genera. Lake Michigan water is about 180 ppm Total Alkalinity as Calcium Carbonate, and the total dissolved solids are about 225 to 240 ppm by weight. Jot this down, you may never need to know it but when you do need it, you got it. Medium hardness. Well water in the northeaster Illinois area tends to run 600 to 1000 ppm total dissolved solids depending on how deep the well is. This would be considered hard water, and could cause problems for some species. With well water you would be best using collected rain water as often as you could. Though well water is better than no water or purchased bottled water. Water twice with rain water, once with well water is an okay plan if summer is too dry to collect enough rain water for all the watering. Lake Michigan tap water is good enough I don't bother collecting rain water. ''Another useful approximation''.

Fertilizer - you are correct, your trees will not need fertilizer until spring. Mira-acid, Miracle grow are great as soluble fertilizers. Osmocote - it is something I have used, but there are some tricks to using it. We can talk about this later. Keep it, if is already on your shelf. Some recommend organic fertilizer, I personally prefer the inorganic water soluble. There is no right or wrong here, just different techniques. The best thing about soluble inorganic fertilizers is that you can precisely control the timing of fertilizer applications. The MSU formulations of inorganic fertilizers are far superior in terms of total nutrition to any organic and the majority of brand name fertilizers. Again, more later, got all winter to chew over this topic.

Brown needles - don't worry. most likely normal. If they fall off easy just pick off and discard. Leave if they don't pull away easy. Sequoia may or could turn a bronze color for the winter. The bristlecone might also. This is normal. Some trees have a dramatic color color change to their needles, some don't. Some junipers turn purple, some stay green. It varies. Because of the color change if the needles don't easily pull off just leave them, it could be normal winter bronze color.

Shaping - not now. Never wire a tree AFTER repotting. The tree needs to get re-established and roots need to firm the tree up in the pot. The jostling of wiring can break brand new root tips setting the tree back further. So no wiring now. Probably late summer, or autumn, or early winter 2019 will be the first time you want to wire or even begin to consider shaping. Often wiring, shaping, pruning can be done just before repotting. This varies depending on the health of the tree.

Okay, enough for one post. I'm going to pour myself a cup of coffee, and I get back later to you on your species choices.
Check with BONSAI SOIL BY jACK good products and great info on planting
 

Bonsai Nut

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Of all three trees, giant sequoia is certainly the hardiest.

If you go to this site, you can see photos of sequoias being planted all around the world - including some pretty big ones in Sweden and Germany. If they can handle the winter in Wisconsin or Wyoming, I think they should be ok in Chicago. But your experience is the only one that matters :)

https://www.giant-sequoia.com/gallery/usa/
 

Halifax

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This is a great thread with a high density of information for neophytes. Thanks, everyone.
 

moke

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Of all three trees, giant sequoia is certainly the hardiest.

If you go to this site, you can see photos of sequoias being planted all around the world - including some pretty big ones in Sweden and Germany. If they can handle the winter in Wisconsin or Wyoming, I think they should be ok in Chicago. But your experience is the only one that matters :)

https://www.giant-sequoia.com/gallery/usa/
Here’s a Giant Sequoia, though not very Giant this tree is a very tough special Giant. It is planted next to the copper smelter I work at, high on a barren ridge next to the Great Salt Lake. This tree gets next to no water in the summer months and experiences brutal cold dry winds in the winter. You can also see where the elk and deer have done there pruning. This tree was planted by a guy that use to work at the old Smelter that was here probably around 100 years ago. After retirement he would trespass at night and plant trees around the site to replace the trees they had cut down over the years for use in the smelting process. He did this on his own dime for some time until the company caught wind of what he was doing and instead of calling the sheriff they started to provide the seedlings. He was referred to as Johnny Appleseed of the Oquirrh mountains. There are several verieties of pines planted, I am not sure how many Sequoias he planted but this is the only one still standing today. What a tough tree, this summer there was a fire that burnt the entire mountain it stands on and a lot of the lower branches were burnt but I believe it will survive. Guess we will see come spring.
I just wanted to share the story of this Giant Sequioa and how tough they can be.
Here’s a link to a story about him in People Magazine.
https://www.google.com/amp/s/people...fe-in-the-mountains-of-utah-vol-34-no-21/amp/

9B2BCABE-1D41-4953-A4D8-4B87A51C319B.jpeg
 
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