Colorwork Nursery

Sweating Bareroot Trees

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by

Lisa
in ,

Handling bareroot trees and shrubs is easyish, kind of. Sweating is a technique that helps ensure the success of some species.

Sweating is not necessary for all bareroot, just certain species. if you skip this step you risk allowing the buds to harden and either not open or take so much energy for the leaves to come through that it weakens the tree.

What sweating does is take advantage of the moisture and warmth in the ground to soften the hard casing on the buds. This occurs naturally in trees that are planted, but holding them in cold storage, no matter how lovely, is unnatural, and some species need a little coaxing to get their blood moving again.

See the redbud burrito under this table? Redbuds are one of those species that needs sweating so I’ve laid them down and covered the roots with wet straw, then covered them head to toe with plastic and sealed the edges. I’ve blocked the sun with the crates.

I was surprised at some of the trees- redbud, ok she’s a diva, dogwood, blue beech, all seem reasonably hard, but willow? well it’s on the list but seems hard to imagine a willow languishing.

This is a good publication that describes the process. If you have to do it it’s ok and kind of fun! Gives you time to dig your hole anyway.

https://trees.umn.edu/sites/trees.umn.edu/files/2021-10/tree_sweating_faq_sheet.pdf

I’ll be potting the plants that need sweating first. Feel free to stop me and try it for yourself.

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