Fast Growing Shade Trees

Fred starts a list of fast growing shade trees

Episode Transcript

(00:00):
My friend I saw an interesting listthis week, and I wanted to run

(00:03):
it by you because just listening toyou over the years, I know that
you would have had a heart attackif you heard somebody recommend this list.
But a gentleman wrote in to us. I'm not even going to say what
the specific website is, but it'sa website that deals with trees. And
he wrote in and he said,I have a patio faces West. I

(00:23):
just built it, but it wasso hot this summer. I need some
quick shade. Can you suggest somefast growing trees that would give me shade?
And they made a list of twelvefast growing trees, but I think
they just picked fast growing trees.They didn't really think about what is right
and what is not right for someone'slawn. And I know that you agree

(00:44):
or disagree with some of these trees. So I thought we'd go down through
the list of fast growing shade treesand you could give me your opinion on
them. I'd be happy to dothat mark, and of course I will
have certain bias, but at thesame time, it's usually based on horticulture
appropriateness. So down through the listand see what happens. Yeah, I'll
try to avoid the heart attack part. Okay, Well, this is the

(01:04):
time of year when people are thinkingabout this kind of thing, because you
know, they know what happened thispast summer. They want to get ready
for it in the spring. Sothe first fast growing shade tree they recommended
was quaking aspen. What do youthink of that one? If you're down
in southeastern Ohio in coal mine soil, oils that are acidic and nasty and
so on, and near pond forwater, I'd say the quaking aspen is

(01:29):
fine. I don't know of manyin the central Ohio area, very very
very matter of fact, I onlyknow of one home that tree was used.
It happens to be located in aspot that was good for it and
good for the property. So yeah, one out of a thousands. That's
my thought on the quaking aspen.Okay, kind of wasting your money on

(01:49):
that one. How about the northernCatalpa. Well, now, a friend
of mine who is now deceased startedan organization that was directly opposed to the
use of catalpat anyplace all rest inpeace. But at the same time,
it's not a bad tree in aI'm going to call it a back forty

(02:15):
we as a kid, I calledit an Indian cigar tree. It's not
all bad, however, many people, even though the plant is beautiful in
flower, it's as long as it'sin somebody else's yard because when the petals
drop, it makes one heck ofa mess on the lawn. I would
say for limited use only. Nowthe tree grows well here, uh,

(02:38):
it just isn't one that's up topar for the normal landscape. So okay,
but careful where you put it.As long as it's three doors away
in the neighborhood, you're okay.Okay, I'm thinking those are two no's
so far. The Hackberry tree,well, now, Hackberry I have mixed

(02:58):
emotions about the native, and thenative is a good tree here, very
sturdy, very big, very veryeverything except that a couple of insect problems,
and then its basic growth can bea little bit ordinary. However,
given a native tree, and thereare some cultivars coming along that I have
been now somewhat time tested. Sowhere when you're stuck for a sturdy tree

(03:23):
that can handle the clay and garbagethat Ohio turns out in weather wise,
it's on Hackberry is okay, orfrom the standpoint of some of the new
cultivars, the native no, because, among other things, it has a
little insect problem. It doesn't hurtthe tree, but the insect is so
small it can come through the normalhouse screens on the window, and let's

(03:46):
just say, it can make thehousewife pretty angry. So I would be
careful with the Native. But atthe same time, I'm looking forward to
it coming into the future as areally well chosen tree for our nasty soils.
Okay, what about the red sunsetmaple, Well, I have mixed
emotions on it. I know thatif it's on its own route and it's

(04:11):
planted in the right place, it'sgoing to be okay and in the color,
and it's chosen for its color.However, it's a fairly fast growing
tree, and I'm somewhat opposed tothe grafting of trees anymore. Now it's
a good way for production, butI don't like it for the future health
of the tree. But as faras red Sunset is concerned, I'd put

(04:33):
it on the okay list, butI wouldn't use it for a well for
this gentleman's shade and fast growth.I wouldn't trust the tree to give me
shade on the patio over the periodof a long time and from that west
sun. Okay, well, I'mabout to use a four letter word here.

(04:54):
I guess silver maple. Oh,you're right. I'm watching the heart
attack meter right now. A silvermaple is not my favorite tree, obviously,
now I do know. And I'veargued with a good friend over time

(05:15):
just to rile him for that matter. He thinks silver micle is okay more
often than I do. It's fastgrowing. However, I'm going to go
to my own front yard. Ihave an oak that was planted six or
seven years after a silver maple wasplanted in the adjoining property. My oak

(05:36):
is now bigger, better, andso on. The silver maple is there.
This last spring the home owner waswell, let's just say primed to
cut it down and not actually,but it had seven bazillion seeds come down
out of it. That just madea mess. They grew in his gutters
and as well as mine and swan. It's a plant that is high rooted.

(05:59):
It'll use the nasty in a lawn. The high rooted factor, however,
makes it quite good when you haveto have fast shade in a heavy
clay soil, because the plant willgrow in almost any kind of yuck soil.
But I've helped cover over the rootsof some of them that come to

(06:20):
the surface that just drive a mowingsituation nuts. I have helped cut the
roots off of the tree by youknow, it's a tree that people ended
up wanting to keep because of itssize, but the lawn was driving them
nuts or the factors in the lawns. So we cut some roots, a
few at a time each year.For several years they kept the tree,

(06:43):
but at the same time they wereconstantly annoyed with other than the fact that
it grew fast. It gave themshade where they needed it. Now,
let's just put a big no byit. Yeah, you have to.
Yeah, that's what I thought.The next three are all oak varieties,
Okay. One is the northern redoak, one is the pin oak,
and one is the sawtooth oak.Any favorites there, Well, yes,

(07:10):
I have the northern rid in myfront yard, and as I was just
mentioning, it went in long afterthe neighbor's silver maple had been planted.
It took a year to get situated. We put it in as I think
about us, maybe a five orsix inch diameter tree, so it had
some size. It took a yearto get started, which is typical.

(07:31):
But right now it is bigger,broader, better than the silver maple next
door. By far, it hasgrown well, essentially faster than the silver
maple, but with caution, bythat meaning it's been fertilized every three or
four years. It has had arborculturecare in terms of thinning it out as

(07:53):
recently as two weeks ago. It'sjust a far better tree. And when
you take care of an oak withtree and you know, proper planning and
so on, it is in myfront yard, I would not hesitate.
Well, let me finish up withthe riddle. I have had exceptionally good
luck with it. On anything Ilearned from another arbors that I should have

(08:16):
known better. But he was.He was in said well a number of
years ago, fitting out the treeand doing some of the right things,
and I kept I mentioned to himtwice that it kept dropping a lot of
dead stems, twigs, little bittybranches and so on. He looked out
of the tree at me and hesaid, Fred, that's what oaks do.

(08:37):
There you go so anyhow, exceptfor the twigs in the yard,
it is fine. The pinoak I'mcautious about, at least where I live
here now north of Columbus. Weused to go to an area that was
then farmland and a woods and markpinoaks to be dug. They were dug

(08:58):
in a manner such as to getthe up there at the right time.
They were native grown. Let's justsay, got permission to buy them.
Then for a year or two wedid a little punning on them, then
dug them as gold growing trees,and they were doing fine in that area.
You put them into our clay soilsjunk, in my opinion, in
Upper Arlington and in such places,it's going to perhaps turn into a plant

(09:24):
that needs constant attention from the additionof let's just say, well fertilizer in
itself, but also most especially theacidification so that it doesn't turn chlorotic.
Because I've seen oaks that almost turnedgolden before they die. There's a chemistry
that you had to be careful of. And at the same time, there

(09:45):
are some beautiful oaks in Upper Arlington. It's just which tree has the tolerance
and which soil did it go inso I would say a little bit of
caution there, but it's a wonderfultree. The only thing you have to
know is, and I got introuble with the klan years ago. In
essence, she wanted a pinoak.I found her a beautiful pin oak in

(10:07):
the nursery, etc. And weplanted it and it came the normal time
of year, it defoliated. Well, I hesitate there, because that's not
uncommon for a pinoak. But atthe same time, she had grown up
in another area where the pinoak heldits leaves and they are certainly capable of

(10:30):
that. Well, she didn't wanta naked tree in the wintertime, so
we had a chat about that.But it was a perfectly good tree for
sawtooth is a little uncommon, butit's a perfectly good tree for around here.
What about the American sweet gum?Sweet gum is on its northern limits
here, and if you're interested init, and there's no reason not to

(10:50):
be, be sure, you getinto what is called the northern strain.
All kinds of plants come from differentseed situations, have grown up than genetically,
so to speak, in different areas. If you get a northern type
of tree that has grown in theChicago land area. For example, you're
going to have a fine tree.If you get one that comes up out

(11:13):
of the south from a south feedsource, you're probably going to have problems
with it. I can go backin time and talk to about losing a
bid on Street trees because I soughtout and found Northern Supply and they ran
ten dollars more per tree for thirtytrees for Street. I lost the bid.

(11:35):
The trees are all gone, havebeen for a long time because they
were Southern stock. So a littlecaution, but it's a beautiful tree in
terms of fall color.