Chestnut Grove (5-Tree Native Bundle)

When your box arrives

Open the box the day it arrives and plant within 2 to 3 days.

Check the peat around the roots. It should feel like a wrung-out sponge. If it has dried in transit, sprinkle it with water and re-wrap.

If you can't plant right away, keep the bundle wrapped, damp, and cool. An unheated garage, shed, or cellar between 35 and 45°F will hold the trees for about a week. Keep them out of sun, wind, and freezing temperatures.

If you need longer than a week, heel them in. Dig a shallow trench in a shaded spot, lay the roots in, cover them with loose damp soil or mulch, and water. Heeled-in trees keep until the ground is ready, as long as they stay dormant.

On planting day, soak the roots in a bucket of plain water for 1 to 2 hours. Carry the trees to the site in the bucket. Bare roots can dry out in minutes of sun and wind.

At a glance

Use this table to decide where each tree goes before you dig. The two big trees, chestnut and persimmon, want your sunniest open ground. Serviceberry and red mulberry will take part shade.

These are seedlings, so every tree is genetically its own. Size, timing, and fruit will vary a little from tree to tree. If your box included a regional substitute, the planting and first-year sections still apply.

Planting, step by step

Plant any time the trees are dormant and the ground isn't frozen. All five go in the same way.

1. Mark your spots using the spacing in the table. Call 811 a few days ahead to have buried lines located.
2. Clear grass and weeds from a circle 3 feet across. Grass is a young tree's biggest competitor.
3. Dig a hole twice as wide as the spread roots and just as deep as the root system. Rough up the sides if your soil is clay.
4. Set the tree so the root collar sits level with the ground. The collar is the color change where roots meet stem.
5. Spread the roots outward. Let the taproot on chestnut and persimmon hang straight down, never curled or bent into a J.
6. Backfill with the soil you dug out. Skip fertilizer, compost, and potting mix in the hole.
7. Firm the soil with your hands to close air pockets, then water with 2 to 3 gallons.
8. Mulch 3 to 4 inches deep with wood chips across the cleared circle. Keep the mulch a few inches off the trunk.
9. Put a tree tube or wire cage on before you walk away. Deer find new trees fast.

On heavy clay or ground that stays wet, plant on a low mound 6 to 8 inches high. This matters most for the chestnut.

Hybrid chestnut

Give the chestnut your sunniest, best-drained spot and a second chestnut for company. It is the one tree in the box that will not make nuts alone.

Site. Full sun and acidic, well-drained soil. A slope or ridge suits it better than a low spot. Chestnuts fail in soggy ground and in limestone or high-pH soil.

Pollination. Chestnuts are wind-pollinated and need a different chestnut tree within about 100 feet. A lone tree makes burs with empty or shriveled nuts inside.

Care. Train it to a single trunk for the first few years. Water through the first two summers, then leave it alone. Avoid lime and wood ash near the root zone.

Harvest. Nuts drop from mid-September into October as the burs split. Gather them every day or two, wearing gloves. Let them cure on the counter for a few days to sweeten, then refrigerate. Fresh chestnuts spoil at room temperature.

American persimmon

Persimmon is the toughest tree in the box and the slowest to wake up. Expect it to leaf out weeks after everything else.

Site. Full sun gives the most fruit. It handles clay, dry ridges, and bottomland alike. Its roots are naturally black, so dark roots in your box are healthy.

Pollination. Each seedling is either male or female, and you won't know which until it flowers. Females bear the fruit and usually need a male within a few hundred feet. Wild persimmons nearby often do the job.

Care. Protect the taproot at planting and it needs little after that. Train to one trunk. Persimmon rarely needs fertilizer and has few pest problems.

Harvest. Fruit ripens from late September into November. It is ready when it is soft, wrinkled, and falling from the tree. Firm fruit is mouth-puckeringly astringent, so let it drop.

American plum

American plum is a small, fast tree that wants to become a thicket. Decide early whether you want one tree or a hedge.

Site. Full sun and any soil that drains. It fits field edges, fencerows, and hedgerows, and its white bloom is among the first of spring.

Pollination. A single tree may set a light crop. Fruit set is far better with a second, unrelated American plum nearby.

Care. The roots send up suckers several feet from the trunk. Mow around it to keep a single tree, or let the suckers fill in for a wildlife thicket. Branches carry short thorny spurs. Prune out any black, swollen growths on twigs, cutting several inches below them.

Harvest. Red to yellow plums about an inch across ripen in August and September. Pick when they give to a gentle squeeze. The skin is tart and the flesh sweet, which makes them a classic jam and jelly fruit.

Serviceberry

Serviceberry is the easiest fruit in the box. It is self-fertile, fits a small yard, and is usually the first of the five to bear.

Site. Sun to part shade, in moist, well-drained, slightly acidic soil. It grows well at a woods edge or near the house, where you can beat the birds to the fruit.

Pollination. One tree fruits on its own.

Care. Grow it as a multi-stem clump or prune to a single trunk. Water during dry spells for the first two summers. Orange spots on leaves or fruit are cedar rust. Planting away from red cedar and junipers reduces it.

Harvest. Berries ripen in June, turning from red to deep purple. Pick them fully purple for the best flavor, somewhere between blueberry and almond. Birds love them, so check the tree daily once color starts.

Red mulberry

Red mulberry is our native mulberry, a fast grower that handles more shade than the other four. Plant it where dropped fruit won't matter.

Site. Sun to part shade, in rich, moist soil that drains. Keep it away from driveways, patios, and walkways. Ripe fruit stains whatever it lands on.

Pollination. Most seedlings are male or female, and some carry both flower types. Fruit comes from trees with female flowers. Wind carries pollen from other mulberries in the area.

Care. Growth of several feet a year is normal once it settles in. Prune only in winter dormancy, because mulberries bleed sap from spring cuts. Leaves vary from unlobed to deeply lobed on the same tree. That is normal.

Harvest. Berries ripen over several weeks in June and July, turning from red to dark purple. Shake branches over a clean sheet to gather them. Eat or freeze within a day or two.

First-year care

Water, weed control, and protection from deer decide whether a bare-root tree makes it through year one. Everything else can wait.

Water. Give each tree 3 to 5 gallons once a week from leaf-out to leaf drop whenever rain falls short of an inch. One deep soak beats a daily sprinkle.

Weeds. Keep the 3-foot circle clear of grass and top up the mulch each spring. Never use a string trimmer near the trunk.

Deer. Keep a 5-foot tree tube or wire cage on each tree until the branches are above browse height. Leave trunk protection on a few years longer, since bucks rub young trunks in fall.

Voles and rabbits. Wrap the base with an 18-inch cylinder of hardware cloth. Pull mulch back from the trunk before winter so voles can't nest against the bark.

Pruning. Remove only broken or dead wood the first year. Start shaping in late winter of year two.

Fertilizer. None in year one. From year two, a spring ring of compost under the mulch is plenty. Stop feeding by early July so new growth hardens before frost.

Troubleshooting

Most first-year worries are normal behavior for a bare-root seedling. Check here before giving up on a tree.