Wagmore Farm: How We Found Cheap Trees

In the last post, I talked about the trees we plan to plant in The Bloody Great Forest.  Since we need to find and plant more than 300 trees, and my last name isn’t Gates or Buffett, finding inexpensive sources of trees was paramount. 

I started with one of the helpful tree people who helped me evaluate options for the screen.  His business is based North of Seattle.  If you need trees and live up that way,  I highly recommend contacting him.  Unfortunately, the shipping would have been prohibitively high given the number of trees I need, so I had to find trees in and around Wagmore.  One would think that would be easy (it is in the Evergreen State afterall), but it took me a surprising long time…

All the trees we’re planting this time around I find via Craigslist.  I love Craigslist.  I found one grower and one large nursery who, together, provided us with nearly 150 trees.  Cheap.  Apparently one can get good deals on trees in the middle of winter.  Go figure.  We ended up paying between $25-$50 for 5' - 8' trees.  I am very happy with this!

The Husband is working on getting these trees in the ground.  I'll share more of his adventures in tree planting in the next few days, once I get an update.  In the spring, we'll stand back and take a look at the overall screen and try to imagine how it will look from the house.  I want to make sure we have a natural forest look from the house, backed by a thick-you-can't-see-anything-through-it screen.  This might mean buying more larger trees from the nurseries we've already worked with.

If our screen is in good shape, we'll likely fill in the rest of the forest with trees from the county foresters association seedling sale (the same place we got the our first lot of baby trees).  The babies require more tending for a few years, but they're a heck of a lot cheaper, and it's fun to watch them grow…

Here's an image my nephew created for me.  

It captures the impenetrable forest feel perfectly.

If I can't have Ents maybe I can have Flying Monkeys?

Wagmore Farm: Trees! Bring Me Trees!

In my earlier post, I shared the reason I suddenly want to forest a good portion of Wagmore.  Once the decision to plant The Bloody Great Forest was made I entered what I shall now call "The Great Tree Quest."

The stuff to figure out includes:
1- What kind of trees work best for our needs
2 - Where to get affordable trees
3 - How to convince The Husband and My Dad to get the trees in the ground.

Step 1 - What Trees to Choose?

Clearly, a key decision.  We need trees that do well in the climate, grow quickly, remain full year round, and will grow together as a screen.

I, of course, started on the internet by searching for screen tree ideas.  Once I had enough information to be dangerous, I started to talk to people.  I learned that tree people really like to talk about trees (which is both unsurprising and lucky for me), that cedar trees make a great screen, and that cedar trees really like it in my part of Washington State (lucky me, again!).

One of these very helpful tree people has a very helpful website, with a great guide to screen trees.  This helped me decide that the Excelsa Cedar is the best screen tree for Wagmore.  We'll be putting these trees 6' off the fence line, spaced around 8' apart.  When the trees are mature they'll be very full and 30'-35' tall.  They also grow at about 2' a year once established, which will help us get a big screen quickly.

Since no Great Forest is made of just one type of tree, the second layer of trees will include Port Orford Cedars (which can reach 100' tall), Incense Cedars, and maybe some Western Red Cedars.  We'll place these in a second line, close together, and close to the other line of trees - to make our first line of defense very thick.

My goal is to create a dense, imposing forest.  Think Fangorn Forest from Lord of the Rings.  And I'd love some Ents, too.  But I realize that I'll likely have to settle for Corgis and Guinea Fowl as forest protection.

I want my screen to be this thick - and cedars will stay more full than these!

(many thanks to xedos4 / FreeDigitalPhotos.net for use of the photo)

The next layers of trees will include Deodar Cedars, Hemlock, and various other evergreen and deciduous trees to make the Great Forest look natural.  Most of this layer of trees will be added in the spring - with more baby trees from the County seedling sale.

Overall, we anticipate adding 300+ more trees to Wagmore.  That's a lot of trees, so I'm continuing my quest to find them cheaply and get them in the ground.  More on that next time!

More Trees for Wagmore!

I love trees.   When we bought Wagmore, the property had some great trees.  Unfortunately, many of these great trees were planted very close to the house.  Big trees close to the house = bad.  Still, it was hard for The Husband and I when we had to take down those trees.

Then  My Dad mentioned to me that the Washington state foresters association has a seedling sale every year.  I was in!  I placed my order with My Dad, and sent him some cash.   Apparently, the seedling sale is rather like Black Friday deals, with seedlings going fast, so My Dad went early in the morning, and was one of the first in line.

All the trees I wanted were available, so we ended up with 42 baby trees.  I only ordered 40, but since we were buying so many, they threw in 2 extras.  So nice!  My Dad came home with 3 different types of cedars, fir trees, hemlocks, 2 ginkos, and 3 giant sequoias.

Since the trees were tiny, My Dad planted them on the property, in the area that was formerly the garden, and watered them over the summer when things got too dry.  (HUGE thanks to My Dad for all he's done for our baby trees!)

The Tree Nursery.  Hello, babies!

Hemlock.

These are the smallest of all the baby trees.

Cedar - can't remember which type.

Baby fir tree.  

Now that the baby trees are starting to grow, it's time to think about where we'll put them.  Our plan is to put them in their permanent homes in late-April or May.

I spent some time yesterday thinking about the property, and learning about what type of environment each of the babies like.

Here's my draft tree plan:

The screen trees will be 2 of the types of cedars (deodar and incense) plus some older, fast-growing trees that we'll buy from a nursery and mix in.  I want the screens to look natural, not just a long line of trees.

The choice of the screen location in the front of the property is to screen a rather junky barn, bus(?), etc. that our neighbors have.

On the side of the property the screen will be "preemptive."  The next door 20 acres is for sale.  Right now zoned for one house, but you never know.

In the back of the property the screen will be used to block the view of a giant house on the property behind ours.

The other trees will be used to fill in an area that already has some trees.  I want it to be more of a forest  -- with room for a galloping lane running through it, of course.

Here's a view of the forest as it is now.  

All deciduous trees, and needs to be thicker to be

a real NW forest.

I'll do a post when we do our planting.  Oh, and if any of you in the SWWA area want to help, just let me know!