Spring is on the horizon and we know how excited you are about getting started on your lawns and gardens. We share in your enthusiasm and encourage you to get things started by thinking big… As in TREE Big! Our staff is hard at work this month, filling up our lot with hundreds of new trees arriving throughout the month. We have many great varieties to choose from but here are a few suggestions to get you started:
Royal Raindrops Crabapple
Traits: An exciting new crabapple with bright pink to red flowers and deep purple cut leaf foliage. Small persistent fruits provide winter interest. An upright form and good branching lend to a lovely vase shape as it matures. Excellent resistance to scab, rust, and fire blight!!
Height: 20-25 ft.
Width: 20-25 ft.
Water: Moderate
Bloom: Bright Pink/Spring
Zones: 4
Honeycrisp Apple
Traits: This introduction from University of Minnesota is a moderately vigorous tree that produces sweet, crisp and juicy apples. Fruit ripens evenly, by late September and holds well on the tree, so you can harvest over an extended period of time. Fruit stores very well up to five months.
Height: 12-16 ft.
Width: 12-16 ft.
Water: Moderate
Bloom: Mid Spring
Zones: 4-7
Yellowwood
Traits: Yellowwood leaves unfurl a bright yellowish green and darken to medium green in summer. Long panicles of pea-like, fragrant white flowers appear among the small, rounded compound leaves in early summer. Foliage turns golden yellow in autumn. Upright arching branches give an elm-like, vase shape to this refined shade tree. Its open, spreading canopy and deep roots make this North American native tree a good shade tree choice for landscapes where it is important to be able to plant beneath its canopy. Smooth light gray bark is similar to that of American Beech and enhances the tree’s graceful winter silhouette. Though uncommon in the wild, Yellowwood has proven adaptable under cultivation and in city settings, tolerating high pH as well as acid soils.
Height: 30 ft.
Width: 40 ft.
Bloom: White, in long clusters/ Spring
Fall Color: Brilliant yellow
Zone: 4
Romeo Bush Cherry
Traits: This new introduction was under development for nearly fifty years and due its small size it is perfect for the home garden. Developed at the University of Saskatchewan this very cold hardy, naturally dwarf tree produces abundant, dark red, almost black fruits that are great for baking and making juice. Self-Fertile.
Height: 9-12 ft.
Width: 7-10 ft.
Water: moderate
Bloom: White/Spring
Zone: 2b
Originally published on March 4th, 2016.