Q. How do I transplant plants from one area to another? A. You can move anything if you can move the root ball. From a practical perspective, move them in winter. The approach to this would be to trench around the plant so as to make the root ball more manageable. Dig a trench 4 inches wide around the plant at the point where you want the root ball to be. Then fill the trench with peat moss or rotted compost or leaf mold. This will encourage the development of feeder roots.
Feed the plant with a complete, long lasting food and keep it watered until winter reduces the need. Once the plant is as dormant as it will get, move it.
Dig a good sized hole and use a slow break down food like Fertrells Poultry Compost pellets, Blood meal, Bone meal, Green Sand, Fish meal, Kelp meal, Espoma Plant Tone, leather meal, etc.
Try to find some compost, spent mushroom compost or even peat moss, or anything that will mix with the clay or sand to better the soil rather than replace the soil you removed. When planting a tree, Organic Plant food makes so much sense - the 10-10-10 salt based plant food may last as little as 30 days then the tree will have to be fed by a pressure feed tube. Organic Foods like Kelp meal can prevent Micronutrient problems for 10 years, for one example.
Put the food very deep so the roots will grow deep and the plant will thrive. That one law of feeding has given me healthy, long living trees and plants. Get a black soaker ring for each tree. Then get an inexpensive hose and run it from the hose hook up, to just past last tree. Use a hose clamp to place a plastic T hose connector cut at each tree along the feed hose.
When you have the hose hooked up and a cap on the end of the feed hose, put a shut off piece between the faucet and hose. Now if you get a hot dry spring and summer, you can use the soaker rings on low pressure and drip them every day for as much as four hours a day. Deep watering is critical at this stage.
Water is the key to warm weather survival for transplanted plants, outside of dormancy. The only way to deep water is with a drip system that puts water slowly down deep. You can also spray the tree off to cool and clean the leaves and trunk; do this in the late afternoon and evening.
Trenching makes a more predictable root ball for digging while encouraging the development of feeder roots before the move. The feeder roots are the key to survival of the plant. Moving plants is hard on them, especially older plants. Moving them in the winter means that there are fewer plants that need a lot of care at that time of the year. Cold weather makes for less stress on the plant.
If you could remove the entire root ball, you could move them easily. Root balls can be quite fragile and difficult to cut without damaging large sections of them. A complete root ball may be as large as the top of the plant.
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