Sapling Division: Kanorin's Betula Nigra riverbank grove

[Kanorin]

My neighbor's river birch dumps seeds all over my garden, so I left a few to grow last year and dug them up earlier this spring and arranged them. Maybe it's just me, but when I think "river birch," my first thought goes to a river scene. So here is my preliminary arrangement for a riverbank birch grove. The "river" is that negative space on the right. Potted in a $7 plastic pot drainage saucer that I drilled a bunch of holes into...good short term solution until it gets a bit more established.


Bird's eye view:

 

[LittleDingus]

Maybe it's just me, but when I think "river birch," my first thought goes to a river scene. So here is my preliminary arrangement for a riverbank birch grove.

Anymore, when I think "river birch" my first through goes to "cookie-cutter landscaping" Every neighborhood I drive through around here every other house has a river birch clump. My son's house came with a 3 tree clump and two stand alone trees. Heck, even my new house has a 3 tree clump!

The county conservation district had 5 packs of river birch seedlings for $6 about a month ago. I _almost_ picked up a couple to make a a few clumps because I *DO* like them and ours is older and burning out and needs to be replaced...but they are _waayyy_ overused as landscape trees here so I couldn't bring myself to do it

They are a pioneer species...they grow so dang fast and fuse so dang easily that you may need to be careful or your forest will turn into a clump

 

[Kanorin]

Anymore, when I think "river birch" my first through goes to "cookie-cutter landscaping" Every neighborhood I drive through around here every other house has a river birch clump. My son's house came with a 3 tree clump and two stand alone trees. Heck, even my new house has a 3 tree clump!

The county conservation district had 5 packs of river birch seedlings for $6 about a month ago. I _almost_ picked up a couple to make a a few clumps because I *DO* like them and ours is older and burning out and needs to be replaced...but they are _waayyy_ overused as landscape trees here so I couldn't bring myself to do it

They are a pioneer species...they grow so dang fast and fuse so dang easily that you may need to be careful or your forest will turn into a clump

Where I live, where the neighborhood was developed in the 1920s, 30s and 40s - not too many of these in the landscape. But when I drive around some newer developed areas, I see lots. Not sure if they became popular later, or maybe the older ones have died off, since this appears to be a shorter lived species compared to most deciduous.

Nevertheless, river birch being a quickly growing species might be an advantage for this contest. And their propensity to drop branches is a little bit less of an issue in a forest planting…at least that is an educated guess. Let’s see if I can style this so it doesn’t instantly make you think “suburban cookie-cutter landscaping” because that would be an epic fail from my point of view

 

[LittleDingus]

Many years ago, the white paper bark birches were growing in clumps in all the neighborhoods. I liked those too. At that time I didn't know the more brown/tan river birch even existed. When I first saw a clump in a yard, it was my new favorite tree!

The 3 trunk clump that came with this house is 20 years old and starting to show some end of life stresses. One trunk lost a major branch sometime recent and I'm worried what's left will split and fall on the garage

It drops a ton of twigs everytime the wind blows!

It will get cut down this year for an addition we're adding. I haven't decided if I'll replace it yet. I will keep the wood and maybe make a few nice stands...and maybe turn a set of bowls

...and yeah, I'll be keeping an eye on this thread for signs of suburbia