Bald Cypress Forest Repot & Placement

[HENDO]

Hey All,

It is time to repot my little Bald Cypress forest - the roots almost pushed this thing off of the slab! Here is the previous thread from last year on making it:

Is this tree placement bad?

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I'm looking for some input on two things:
1. Repotting a BC Forest: how to go about doing this. Lots of intertwined roots, do I need to actually separate all of the trees or can I just trim roots around the edge and repot this "plate"? @Zach Smith , @BillsBayou ?
2. Tree Placement: specifically looking for input on the right-side. I have 3 smaller trees in the right-front that tend to block the 1st & 2nd main trees. If I'm going to move anything it would likely be 1 or all of these. Thoughts? Hopefully Mr. @William N. Valavanis can give some thoughts

Here it is partially defoliated for the HBS 2020 Fall Show:


Here it is today freshly wired:


Front/Top View:


Bottom of "Plate" after cutting anchors and scraping off of the slab:


Looking forward to the feedback and thanks in advance. I have it covered in a wet T-Shirt for now and it will be something to work on during this cold front.

-HENDO

 

[Cadillactaste]

Looks great! I think it's good that the roots have meshed. I might look on top and any really wonky roots that detract...try and simplify. But great job!

 

[Zach Smith]

Don't separate the trees unless you're dissatisfied with their placement. Mostly trim around the edges. If need be you can take out a few wedges deeper in. But you want your forest to function as much as a whole as it can.

 

[HENDO]

Looks great! I think it's good that the roots have meshed. I might look on top and any really wonky roots that detract...try and simplify. But great job!

Good call, I'll go ahead and scrape the moss off the top and see what doesn't look good up there - the bonus will be bringing the soil level down a bit to show off the mini nebari on these "sticks on a slab"! Thanks!

 

[HENDO]

Don't separate the trees unless you're dissatisfied with their placement. Mostly trim around the edges. If need be you can take out a few wedges deeper in. But you want your forest to function as much as a whole as it can.

Confirmed & thanks Mr. Zach. This is good to hear because separating them all would be a chore for sure. I'll trim around the edges and look for anything majorly out of place and wedge out if needed. Perhaps the only separation I'll do is on these 3 smaller trees in the right/front to open up the view a bit to the primary trees. Still not 100% sure on a plan for that yet! Thanks much

 

[BillsBayou]

Repotting a BC Forest: how to go about doing this. Lots of intertwined roots, do I need to actually separate all of the trees or can I just trim roots around the edge and repot this "plate"? @Zach Smith , @BillsBayou ?

What Zach said. The forest went through all the trouble of stabilizing itself with its roots. Untangling the trees would mean never getting them all back on the slab together.

 

[HENDO]

Thanks @Zach Smith and @BillsBayou for the responses much appreciated!

I ended up separating 3 of the smaller trees from the right side in an attempt to rearrange slightly and correct the hidden tree issue and bring the primary tree forward. However I am now regretting this and you will see why in the pictures.

It was very difficult to clump these back together in the desired arrangement, and I ended up with two almost perfectly aligned rows which is exactly what I wanted to avoid. Additionally, the primary tree is now quite loose, as you warned about.

Lastly, some of the negative space was lost so it now looks like a "filling the pot" scenario.

Oh well, chalk it up as a good learning experience.

This work was done just before the big TX freeze so this spent a good week in the garage - fingers crossed. Will post pictures of the repotting process and some lessons learned since the initial potting.

 

[HENDO]

Working inside since it was already down to 20F at this point. Not an ideal place for repotting stinky Bald Cypress.

Plenty of good rootage since initial potting last year. Note that roots did not fill the mucked areas as I had hoped, first lesson:


I'm cutting all of the roots below the plastic mesh used for anchoring last year, and removing the mesh. This was done to lower the profile on the slab back to where it was, under the assumption that these trees would stay together well enough in their respective clumps - first mistake?

 

[Maiden69]

Any reason for not cleaning up the top soil? Other than to save the moss cover?

NVM, I see your new post where you have the trees separated...

 

[HENDO]

Next, I separated the trees from the right side into 2 clumps. The 3-tree clump from the left side came apart from the group easily as their own clump. Most of the roots pruning happened underneath and on the sides, but some obtrusive roots from the top were also removed as @Cadillactaste suggested:

 

[HENDO]

Anchor wires were assembled onto my repaired slab. Don't laugh at the repair it had to be done very quickly last year. I will try to source/make a slightly larger and more well reinforced slab for next repot.

Drilled some more anchor holes since I won't be using mesh and chopsticks this time.

This is 17g galvanized steel wire. I've seen some people using this for anchor wire and have had success using it myself recently for single-tree plantings. However, this type of wire was very difficult to use for a forest/group planting and I do not recommend it unless you are very experienced using it. Although I only broke one connection throughout the process, this wire did not give me one cohesive "net" to hold the clumps down, instead it ended up being a bunch of separate rigid connections across the clumps that left little room for error.

Stick with aluminum - second lesson learned for me:

 

[HENDO]

Last year I used a lot of muck but since there was minimal root growth into it, I decided to use it sparingly only to form a true rim around the slab. The top of the rim will be folded over the soil before mossing-up:


Bottom layer of soil. I'm using 100% akadama, 1/8" sifted. No need for a drainage layer for obvious reason - these are Bald Cypress:

 

[HENDO]

Clumps arranged and tied-down.

This is where things got interesting, and where there was a departure from the critical replacement initiative... oh well, will do a better job next year:

 

[HENDO]

Fill up to the rim with soil and fold the rim over. Layer of sphagnum moss on top. I see a lot of people slapping muck over soil in order to stick green moss to and to keep mounded soil from slipping - I did this last year and it isn't necessary. A good layer of sphagnum and good sheets of green moss won't move a bit:




Whether I'm harvesting new moss or salvaging from a previous planting, I place the sheets on screens and hose them down well to remove any leftover soil. I find this much more effective than scraping the bottom of the moss, and if you have good strong sheets they stay together just fine. You are left with a nice clean and thin sheet:

 

[HENDO]

Here it is today. Still not happy with the 2D placement, lack of perspective, but I definitely recommend small BC as a fun forest project - challenging but rewarding to keep them "small". The tallest/primary tree will be developed into a skinny flat top:


I left a gap in the moss at the base of the trunks, this is where I place most of the fertilizer. I'm sticking with low NPK, organics for this planting in an attempt to help keep the trees from exploding upward and to discourage the leggy branching BC are well known for. It is highly acidic and my BC seem to love it:


Buds starting to swell, will post pictures once it leafs-out!

 

[Apex37]

Hey Paul, hope you've been doing good! How's the forest coming along? This guy leafing out?

Caleb