When shopping for a Christmas tree at your local lot or tree farm, you’ll likely encounter many different types of evergreen Christmas trees. Picking out a perfect tree isn't easy. A tree's scent, color, strength of branches, shape, height, and needle retention all matter. Depending on where you live will determine what type of trees … Continue reading Evergreen Christmas Tree Guide: What is the best?
Walking the fields to find the perfect live Christmas tree has become a tradition for many families. Not only is the tree an important part of the holidays, but garland, mistletoe, and wreaths as well. The bright red berries of the Holly trees look stunning against the green backdrop of leaves and needles in our … Continue reading Holiday Holly Tree Berry-Best Practices
In our last blog, we talked about soil types affecting the availability and uptake of plant nutrients. Sandy soils , which drain quickly, may not have sufficient N, P and K due to leaching, as the water rapidly leaves a sand area. Over the years rains can remove a lot of nutrients from a porous area to the garden. Regular watering is needed to establish new trees and may move materials away also, from sandy planting mix. If you could see a cross section of the soil draining, the water you are applying moves rapidly out of the sand in a more pointed, dagger like profile.
Picking out live eco-friendly Christmas trees has become a tradition for many families. Oh, the fun of walking amongst the trees to find the right one to fit your space with the perfect shape. Getting the tree home and standing upright in the stand without falling over well, can be an adventure too... hahaha. The … Continue reading Eco-Friendly Christmas Trees
Fall is a great time for planting. As temperatures cool, transplanting is less stressful on plants as they slowly become dormant with less new growth,
The largest evergreen trees for privacy screening that we grow and transplant, are 15 feet tall Thuja Green Giant Arborvitaes. For almost 40 years we have successfully planted large green giant privacy screens throughout the Baltimore/Washington area. Our green giant trees are grown from rooted cuttings at Pryor's Nursery in Damascus, Maryland. On our website we … Continue reading How Tall Are The Evergreen Trees We Grow Locally?
It's that time of year again when bagworms could appear and unfortunately, they damage plants. Bagworms prefer juniper, arborvitae, spruce, pine, and cedar but also attack deciduous trees. Bagworm control can be done easily and without pesticides. The bags hold over 300 eggs in the cocoon and disperse in late spring by "ballooning" or crawling. … Continue reading Bag Worm Control
Early this spring a client asked me to plant our Nellie Stevens Holly trees to form a privacy screen at his place in Oxford, Maryland. Wow!! Oxford, Maryland, home of the original Nellie Stevens Holly, is where ~ 100 years ago, gardener Nellie R. Stevens experimented with holly cross-breeding and cultivated a new variety that carries … Continue reading Home of the Original Nellie Stevens Holly
The Nellie Stevens is denser than most upright pyramidal hollies. It responds well to pruning, creating additional lateral tip buds at each pruning cut. Nellie Stevens hollies tolerate wet feet well. At our evergreen tree farm in Damascus, Maryland, the clay soils are often super saturated through the winter but the Nellie Stevens holly is able to grow in these conditions.
Today we also use holly trees to create beautiful living fences for year round privacy screening. The holly trees can be trimmed a bit during the holiday season so you can make your own wreath or kissing ball. Or, you can go eco friendly by using a live holly tree as your holiday tree, then plant it in your yard afterwards.
