It's All About Habitat

By Joseph Krug

The woods—whether viewed from the ground on a morning hike or among the branches during an autumn afternoon spent in a tree stand—is a complex ecosystem at every level. Few sportsmen observe and even fewer appreciate the balance of food supply for the wildlife and game, which draws millions of families back to the forest every year. Left unchecked by nature, such biomes eventually mature past the point of providing sustenance to the animals they once fostered, while barren, reclaimed strip mines common throughout the Eastern US can be quickly overtaken by nonbeneficial trees relegating them to a shadow of their former glory.

This book will show you how to help. From selecting and even grafting beneficial fruit, conifer, and hardwood tree species for your home, property, or game lands to nurturing them through adolescence as seedlings in a backyard nursery, easy to understand, step-by-step guides take the guesswork out of habitat improvement for beginner and veteran gardeners, sportsmen, and volunteers alike. You will learn ideal planting locations, how to give your transplanted trees the best chance of survival—including protecting against obstacles as small as mice, as deadly as blights, and as large as black bears—and how to foster and maintain your plantings to maturity.

Helping nature improve wildlife habitat is a selfless and unspoken legacy you will pass on to your children and future generations to come. Your journey begins here.

Joe Krug, 2020

• Language: English
• Publisher: Fulton Books, Inc.
• Release date: Jan 28, 2021
• ISBN: 9781646547302

Book preview

Ten Commandments of Planting Fruit Trees

In an effort to help you understand the importance of these guidelines, I will discuss each commandment on an individual basis.

Commandment I

Sunlight and space are of utmost importance if the tree is to grow and prosper. Choosing a good location is probably the most important step in planting any tree but especially so with a fruit tree.

Almost on a yearly basis, I find that well-intentioned people have planted fruit trees directly beneath an overhead forest canopy. These plantings have zero chance of surviving! Yes, you may occasionally find old apple trees growing in the forest but must recognize when these trees established themselves. The area was most likely being utilized for agricultural crops or pastureland when those trees were planted.

If your food plots are small, it is advisable to plant your trees near the center of your HBO. On larger plots, trees should be planted at least fifty feet from the forest edge. Remember, you want to keep all trees well away from the root zone of the surrounding hardwoods. Tree roots will extend well beyond the dripline of their branches. Too close and the encroaching trees will rob water, sunlight, and nutrients from the young trees.

Trees planted too close to the woods have a tendency to grow away from the surrounding forest and toward the sunlight, developing trees that lean. When small, this is of little concern. However, when the tree approaches peak bearing years, it is a condition that is usually fatal to the tree.

Trees that lean off-center are prone to topple when subjected to heavy out-of-balance fruit loads. Remember, you want fruit, not firewood.

Commandment II

Prepare a washtub-sized hole to plant the bare rootstock. I usually scatter about a one-fourth cup of 10–10–10 fertilizer on the bottom of the hole before I plant the tree. If topsoil is available, fill the entire hole with it. If you are short on topsoil, utilize it on the bottom of the hole and around the root zone. Clay and subsoil can be used to fill the rest of the hole.

I grow my own fruit trees in five-gallon buckets, which serve as pots. With container-grown trees, transplant shock is minimized, and a much-smaller hole is satisfactory. It is a huge advantage to plant potted trees. They are more expensive, but their survival rate is much higher, and labor requirements are greatly reduced.

Commandment III

Select nursery stock, which produces standard-sized trees. Avoid all dwarf or semi-dwarf-tree stock. It is true that some semidwarf trees, under highly professional care, will outproduce standards. To achieve these results, however, requires a much higher number of trees per acre, under more intensive management. Semidwarfs require more care and are terribly labor-intensive.

Dwarf and semidwarf trees are propagated by grafting desirable species of apples onto a nonaggressive rootstock. Unfortunately, nonaggressive rootstocks produce trees that are not well anchored and topple easily. In commercial orchards, all dwarfing trees are usually trellised with wire or staked with support.

I have witnessed semidwarf apple trees up to 8 inches in trunk diameter that black bears have toppled. I have never seen a standard-sized apple tree toppled by a bear.

Standard-sized rootstock is produced by grafting suitable species of apples onto rootstock that has been grown from apple seeds. Semidwarf stock utilizes root sprouts from cloned, non-aggressive root systems.

A tree’s graft is usually six to twelve inches above the soil line. Look closely for a change in the color of the bark or a slight crook in the trunk of the young tree. Plant the tree deeper than the graft union, and it will develop into a well-anchored standard-sized tree. If you cannot find standard non-rooted trees, your best option is to plant your semidwarf’s graft union (the point where the tree was grafted) below the soil line.

Commandment IV

Select fruit cultivars that are disease resistant. The majority of our most popular species of apples and pears have a low resistance to diseases such as apple scab and fire blight. In commercial orchards, these diseases are controlled by adding fungicides to the pesticide mix, and the trees are sprayed about every six to ten days.

In the wild, regular spray programs are almost impossible to maintain. Your only practical option is to plant fruit (cultivars) varieties that are disease resistant. Thumb through the pages of fruit nursery mail-order catalogs because they are constantly introducing disease-resistant cultivars.

To better understand how fruit tree diseases and fungi negatively impact trees, be certain to read Apple Choices and Pear Choices in this manual.

Commandment V

Space the trees at proper distances. Tree spacing is far more important than most people realize. Plant trees too close together, and they will attempt to grow away from each other in an effort to maximize crown size. Trees that grow away from their counterparts tend to become leaners. When the trees are small, it is of little concern. When they become larger, they develop into leaners and eventually topple because of an out-of-balance, off-center fruit load. Nothing is more depressing than losing a large healthy fruit tree just as it is reaching peak production capacity. Spacing is so very