Dig up Ash sapling and grow in pot?

Dave! · 19-09-2017 02:06PM #1

Hi guys,

My brother has 3 saplings growing in his garden (they were there before he bought it) and he's going to get rid of them, but I want to keep them. I'm pretty sure they're ash, but open to correction.

I'm hoping I might be able to plant one of them in my parents' garden, but the others I was thinking of keeping in pots on my balcony when I move into my new apartment.

I'm wondering is this possible? Will the trees grow like that? How big would the pots need to be? Any other considerations to help ensure they live?

Thanks for any info!

lottpaul · 19-09-2017 03:12PM

They are ash.
Unless they are of some sentimental or other value I would just dig them up and get rid of them. They are not suitable for a pot, not matter what size. They grow very quickly and will not thrive in a container.
They are also unsuitable for any garden except the very biggest -- and even at that I could think of many other trees I'd plant there first. Ash seedings are very common and most people treat them as weeds.
If you really wanted to preserve them I'd dig them up within the next few months and plant them in a hedgerow or wild area.

ytpe2r5bxkn0c1 · 19-09-2017 04:30PM

They are like weeds around here. I pull up 60 to 80 seedlings every year. Not much good as a garden tree. It there's a woodland nearby shove one or two in there but I'd just get rid of them.

Oldtree · 19-09-2017 06:29PM

Dave! wrote: »

Hi guys,

My brother has 3 saplings growing in his garden (they were there before he bought it) and he's going to get rid of them, but I want to keep them. I'm pretty sure they're ash, but open to correction.

I'm hoping I might be able to plant one of them in my parents' garden, but the others I was thinking of keeping in pots on my balcony when I move into my new apartment.

I'm wondering is this possible? Will the trees grow like that? How big would the pots need to be? Any other considerations to help ensure they live?

Thanks for any info!

Hi Dave,

Yes it is. If you have an interest in seeing the plant grow, put it in a pot. You can always dispose of it at a later stage.

It would be best to leave it till November to dig it up bareroot. If you dig it up now take as big a rootball as you can.

Put it into the biggest pot you can. Make sure to leave an inch at the top of the pot between lip of pot and compost.

Ensure you have a tray under the pot. This makes it easy to water the plant and also see when the plant needs water. The tray also stops the tree rooting into the ground.

Every 2 to 3 years you can remove tree from the pot and cut away about a third of the rootball and then replant into pot with a bit of fresh compost. You may also need to prune a bit off the tree.

In a small urban garden in london, I did this with a number of trees to act like a screen and I enjoyed growing the trees. I did not overfertilise them, but water management is important. The red chestnut was one I remember as I got the lovely flowers every year

They will grow slowly and stunted compared to an open planted tree.

Here is a picture of a very old dwarf ash

Thread for further info on the dwarf ash if you are interested

http://touch.boards.ie/thread/2056525292/1/#post76652880

Hocus Focus · 25-09-2017 10:01AM

pwurple · 25-09-2017 10:55PM

Christ, ash are a menace. I must pull around 30 of them a year.

Dave! · 26-09-2017 07:56PM

You monster!

Seth Brundle · 26-09-2017 08:02PM

Hocus Focus wrote: »

Dunno if there's much to burn in the OPs three saplings

Oldtree · 27-09-2017 01:32AM

Enjoy the ash while you can. The disease ash dieback has now been widespread.

ytpe2r5bxkn0c1 · 27-09-2017 10:02AM

Oldtree wrote: »

Enjoy the ash while you can. The disease ash dieback has now been widespread.

According to the Tree Council

they haven’t been as severe as many had feared, giving some hope that the disease can be contained.

It hasn't really hit as it was expected to.

Oldtree · 27-09-2017 11:05AM

Eli Fit Width wrote: »

According to the Tree Council

It hasn't really hit as it was expected to.

If only that were so. (Google is'nt your friend

)

I think you are referring to a Tree Council Web page that is out of date. It refers to DOAFM figures from 2014!

https://treecouncil.ie/ash-dieback/

The current figures and map as of the 31st July 2017 of the known spread of ash dieback can be found on the departments website and paint a very different picture.

http://www.agriculture.gov.ie/forestservice/treediseases/ashdiebackchalara/#currentfindings

As you can see from the dept maps (which excludes garden centers (and a number of other sites that AD was found at) we have planted infected plants throughout the island. These are mainly discovered forestry sites marked on the maps. These infected plants have had plenty of time before being discovered to spread the disease. The wind borne spores can be blown up to 30km per year, although I suspect more.

The impact on the wild population of ash has yet to be fully assessed, but if you take England/Scotland/Wales as an island example, the disease will be efficient.

ash-dieback-plantedsites-dec-2016.jpg?itok=mPU4aJ-s

Forestry uk
https://www.forestry.gov.uk/ashdieback

Melodeon · 27-09-2017 01:47PM

Oldtree wrote: »

I can personally confirm 2 infected sites NOT shown on that map.

To quote the Forest Service person the day they took the samples, "We're at nothing, it's everywhere".

Oldtree · 27-09-2017 03:44PM

Melodeon wrote: »

I can personally confirm 2 infected sites NOT shown on that map.

To quote the Forest Service person the day they took the samples, "We're at nothing, it's everywhere".

In essence we have done it to ourselves. We have planted an awful lot of imported high quality (but diseased) european stock, even after the disease was known to be on the march across other parts of Europe. Also an awful lot of this infected stock would have been distributed through garden centres and nurseries to the general public.

Saying that, early maps of distribution in the UK show wild infected clusters in the south east of the UK (red dots), implying what is now accepted that these infections came on the wind from Europe, a distance further than the 30km put out by early study papers, so easy to see it would have crossed from a heavily infected UK to us on the wind, in the end.

This is one of the UK maps from 2013 giving an early indication of that.

ytpe2r5bxkn0c1 · 27-09-2017 06:12PM

Oldtree wrote: »

In essence we have done it to ourselves. We have planted an awful lot of imported high quality (but diseased) european stock, even after the disease was known to be on the march across other parts of Europe. Also an awful lot of this infected stock would have been distributed through garden centres and nurseries to the general public.

Saying that, early maps of distribution in the UK show wild infected clusters in the south east of the UK (red dots), implying what is now accepted that these infections came on the wind from Europe, a distance further than the 30km put out by early study papers, so easy to see it would have crossed from a heavily infected UK to us on the wind, in the end.

This is one of the UK maps from 2013 giving an early indication of that.

It's a bit skewed by the fact that the biggest study of this is being carried out by the University of East Anglia and that area is much more intensely studied.

Oldtree · 27-09-2017 07:45PM

Eli Fit Width wrote: »

It's a bit skewed by the fact that the biggest study of this is being carried out by the University of East Anglia and that area is much more intensely studied.

That was an old map from 2014, well before any suggestion of the disease being wind borne from the European continent, to illustrate what I felt was obvious at the time from the map.

The UK Forestry Commission is fairly unskewed

with regard to that point

However, now that infected, older trees have been found in South-East England with no apparent association with plants supplied by nurseries, it is thought possible that it also entered by natural means. These include being carried on the wind or on birds coming across the North Sea and English Channel, or on items such as footwear, clothing or vehicles of people who had been in infected sites in Continental Europe.

https://www.forestry.gov.uk/chalara#Origins

Dig up Ash sapling and grow in pot?

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