Strong Winds Need Not Uproot Your Trees!

Tomato cage protecting Catclaw Acacia from being broken by wind but letting it move.

Horrible Winds Ravage Las Vegas! Trees ripped from the ground! 

To watch the news the last couple of days, you'd think this has never happened before. It happens every year. Strong winds whipping through mountain valleys, especially in the Spring is quite common and normal phenomena.  It's what we do to prepare for them, or the lack thereof, that makes the difference between a Spring breeze and a disaster.

There are four things we can do (applies anywhere really) here in the Desert Southwest to keep our trees and the things around them, from becoming a statistic, and possible headline in the news - in a bad way.  Wouldn't it be great if they did a story about a tree that weathered the storm brilliantly and talked to someone who knew about why that was so?

1) Remove all stakes from recently planted trees. Let the tree grow strong by being blown about by the wind. Movement stimulates the plant (all plants) to grow thicker cell walls and to lay down more lignin cells in their trunks and stems. There are ways to make cages that let the trunk move quite a bit, but keep the root ball from rotating or pivoting in the hole. I've successfully used tomato cages that were anchored down on small trees and there are larger ones for larger trees.

If you remove the stakes from a tree and it falls over, it was planted wrong to start with. Dig the tree the rest of the way up, re-dig the hole right and plant the tree right. Before re-planting the tree in the same spot, check to see if it was a good spot to begin with - see #4 below.

2) Water the entire root zone! Do not just put a couple emitters at the base of the trunk. Roots will not grow in dry soil, so you have to apply water at least as far as from the trunk out to the drip line or furthest extent of the tree's branch canopy. If the tree has been butchered and many of the branches have been removed or shortened (probably because it was planted too close to a building, walkway, etc. in the first place), then you need to extend the irrigation out to where the drip line should be for that species of tree or shrub. You can look this up in many books and websites that give details about different plant species. Sunset magazine, your area's university extension service (ours in Las Vegas is University of Nevada), the USDA's NRCS, and some nurseries have excellent information about this.

3) Feed your plants. Leave dead leaves and the smallest branches (twigs) around the bases of the plants so they can decompose and return nutrients and organic matter to the soil in the root zone. Or, if you can't bring yourself to do that, get a leaf vacuum (many are blowers that can be converted with a kit that you buy separately or that comes with them) that sucks the leaves and twigs up, grinds them up and puts them in a bag. Then, spread this ground up mulch (free mulch!) around the tree. Purchased tree bark isn't as good as it doesn't decompose very well especially in the desert, but it's better than rocks. You can also use commercial fertilizer (but please use it with mulch, not instead of it)- read up from the above mentioned sources, especially the university extension services and the NRCS about what different needs different species have. For example, palms need very little nitrogen, but need a lot of potassium and micronutrients.

4) Plant trees smart. Avoid planting them where they will be in the way once they are full grown. The less you 'have' to prune them, the better off they'll be. The above sources talk about the expected height and width of the plant once mature. Sunset is good about adjusting these figures for the desert southwest as many species tend to grow less here, but maybe not as much less as one may think. Plant them also where they will have as much shelter from the prevailing winds as possible. In Las Vegas, the winds swirl a bit, but tend to come from the Southwest in Summer and North in Winter. If there isn't any or much shelter from wind yet, plant several trees - spaced far enough apart so they won't tangle with each other much once full grown - in a windbreak (NRCS has excellent info about this) so that they will create wind protection for other plants in future.

Good sources for further information:

https://www.unce.unr.edu/

http://www.sunset.com/

https://www.nrcs.usda.gov/wps/portal/nrcs/site/national/home/
 

http://forestry.nv.gov/ndf-state-forest-nurseries/planting-information-resources/

First Bloom on Butterfly Bush Recovering From Cat-astauphic Damage

Remember the butterfly bush that we rescued from the clearance rack of 'the orange store' last year?  We carefully pruned the broken branches off it, transplanted it to this bigger pot and eventually planted it in the ground on the East side of the house.


It recovered well and was doing great.....until the neighborhood cats decided it was a nice thing to lay on and play with that is.   So, then we put this little fence around it with a 'roof' of sticks on top to keep them out.







The cats had broken most of the new branches that had grown on it over the winter after we transplanted it and we weren't sure if it would recover from this. 

But now, it has grown a few new branches and one of them is even blooming!  This is one tough plant and is certainly a good choice for landscaping in our climate of the Mojave Desert.  It gets just a little water every day from the soaker hose that you may see in the pictures above. The hose circles around the plant just outside the dripline (or where the dripline was before the cats mangled the plant).  That seems to be all it needs once it is established and is still this size. As it gets bigger, we'll set up a bigger irrigation system for it using netafin tubing.

It is doing well now, but has really lost a lot of ground compared to where it would be by now had it not suffered cat-astrophic damage.  If you have cats, please keep them inside!  Do not let them run your neighborhood tearing up other people's stuff and turning their yards into outdoor litter boxes.  Much of the upkeep for the yard at this house is trying to clean up after all these loose cats.

First bloom on this butterfly bush since the cats mangled it earlier this spring.

Oleanders pruned properly by yours truly

Same Oleanders pruned wrong by someone else

I've been pruning these Oleanders for several years.  This year, I wasn't available when the owner decided to have them pruned.  The person who they hired was asked to cut just a little bit off the top so it doesn't stick above the glass of the windows.  That person chose not to listen and did way too much.

Now, I will do my best to heal the Oleanders back up. It will take a long time.  Many species of shrubs wouldn't even recover from a severe cut like this. Oleanders are among the very few that can.   They will most likely start sprouting from the base before they begin to look like they used to be.  We will probably have to cover them with sheets on cold nights this winter to prevent frost damage. We may try planting Buffalograss underneath instead of Lantanas as the owner has now informed me that they don't want a lot of growth under the Oleanders.  Buffalograss will only get three inches tall or so out here.  

This is a good lesson to learn.  Be careful who you hire.  Make sure you find someone who actually knows what they are doing and will actually listen to you instead of doing whatever they usually do.