Planting hedge trees

[Charlie Tango]

Has anyone ever planted hedge trees (on purpose)?  I have a spot with bad soil and am planting anything that will provide cover.  Do you just sling the hedge apples around or do you soak them in water to get the seeds then plant the seeds?

[keith44]

I have never tried Hedge Apple trees for any reason, on purpose.  I have poor soil in places and am trying to improve the soil instead of just trying to plant anything that'll grow.


Other than cover why Hedge Apple??  Why not crab apple, filbert, or cherry?  For that matter Bald Cypress makes a good cover tree also.  All of these provide a food source, some habitat, and are nicer trees IMO.  Also Black Walnut grows nearly as fast and tolerates poor soils, and can be harvested for timber in as little as 15 years.

[Charlie Tango]

My spot is a closed landfill.  The soil that covers the hill is poor at best.  I am trying to put in anything that will grow and provide cover so the deer will stick around a little.  Now they just walk across it going from food to cover.  I have access to all the hedge apples I can grab, so my wheels are turning.

I am working with the district forester for the state, and he is giving me bare root trees to plant.  The success rate is very low and the trees that do survive are slow growers.

Any help and ideas are welcome and appreciated.

[keith44]

Ok hedge apple will be a quick (free) start, next is grasses and shrubs.  These are a natural progression in re-forestation.  If you have room, no till about 1 or 2 acres in field corn, and just let it go fallow, then the next year move over and do it again and just leave the first fallow.  Pines (like loblolly) grow quickly (for trees) as does sassafras.  Wild blackberries and honey suckle provide low cover and foods and grow and spread well.  The honey suckle will need some structure like an old fence, or some fence posts or similar. 


Get a piece of graph paper, and "build" your property there first, then plant.  What state are you in?  I am in Sebree, Ky, and if we are close enough I can share some trees from my property.

[hillbill]

hedge trees should be easy to start, but yu may regret it.if your not carefull they will take over the whole area.i often get jobs with my dozer rooting them out and piling them here.they do provide some cover but really offer nothing to wildlife other than squirrel food.there has to be something better you can plant?

[Charlie Tango]

Thanks for the advice guys.  Ive been working for about ten years on this hill and Im not seeing the progress I would like.  The transplanted cedar trees are doing the best.  Keith44, I will look into the blackberry and sassafras.  I have corn and been crops on all four sides of the hill so a food plot of corn or beans might not work to well.  The hill is a layer of garbage, a layer of dirt, a layer of garbage, a layer of dirt etc.  The dirt on top is an average of six inches deep.  Thanks again.

[keith44]

the corn is not for a food plot, rather when the other fields are harvested yours is still standing and provides late season cover (that's why you leave it standing)

[no guns here]

Man... too bad we can't send you some mesquite.  This stuff is uncontrollable.
 
 
NGH

[Dixie Dude]

Down south peanuts and soybeans both take their nitrogen from the air and help recondition the soil.  Don't think peanuts will grow that far north.  Honeysuckle and kutzu grow in poor soil down here.  Kudzu is hard to get rid of but grows 1' per day.  I think you are looking for some kind of fast growing trees though.

[keith44]

peanuts will grow in Ky, I've seen me do it    they are just not that popular here 'cause after they're dug they need to be laid out to dry well that's when it gets cold and wet here    otherwise I'd grow a crop every year in rotation with sweet corn.

[Rock Home Isle]

Propagating Osage Orange Trees from Seed

Here is the method that I used when I wanted to see if I could germinate the seeds into seedlings.

1. Pick the horse apples that have fallen to the ground. Do not try to propagate with apples that were picked off the tree.  Take the horse apples and place them in a pile of leaf litter in the garden to over winter. This will stratify the seeds.
 
2. In the spring, remove the horse apples from the garden and break up or pulverize the horse apples. The seeds should easily separate from the husk of the horse apple, but sometimes they do not.  If the seeds do not easily separate from the husk, then place the mash into a bucket of water. Soak the seeds for two to three days, you will know when the seeds are done when they separate easily from the mash and are slippery to the touch. You will want to change the water at least twice per day during this process to keep the mash from fermenting. The first time that I tried this, it fermented. If you are doing this process in your home, trust me you don’t want that to happen.
 
3. Pour the finished mash into a strainer and separate out the seeds. Again the seeds should separate easily and have a slimy feel. Discard the mash.
 
4. At this point you can plant the seeds into the ground directly or put them into pots. I grew my seedlings in one gallon pots. I put potting soil in the pots and planted the seeds ~2 inches deep (one seed per pot). I kept the seedlings under the deck for the summer, where I watered and cared for them. In the fall I then put the potted seedlings in the garden and covered them with leaf litter, soaked them heavily for several hours with a sprinkler and let them  over-winter.

5. The following spring I used a tracor to pull a trench and I then planted the seedlings in the trench and ran a soaker hose so that I could water them. After 2 years...they do not need any care and are quite hardy.

[Mack in N.C.]

I grow Chestnuts, walnuts, pecans , hedgeapples, and some oaks from seed
 
heres the way I do the hedge apples...
 
take the hedge apple and and slice it just like you would a tomatoe.....bury this 1/2 inch deep in a pot....leave outside over winter....come spring time every seed will be sprouting.....I leave them in the pot until the next year and transplant them.....most all of them live,.....Mack

[briarpatch]

You should be able to power your home with the methane that landfill produces and neighbors as well. If I owned a landfill I would certainly look into it. The reason nothing will grow may be the methane coming up through the soil. Dont know just saying.