Grow Scot Pine in Hard Chalky Ground

[nepia]

Why are you persisting with the idea of growing a round peg in a square hole?  Give it up and grow something that will take the chalk - like yew!

[tree_stumps]

12 hours ago, nepia said:

Why are you persisting with the idea of growing a round peg in a square hole?  Give it up and grow something that will take the chalk - like yew!

Hello Nepia,

 

I have always liked the Scot Pine.  Also because with smaller needles, it will suit well with a medium height tree.

 

I cannot have a full size tree anyway at the spot which is available.

 

@openspaceman , I hope I will be able to prune the Scot pine and keep small. Yes sort of Bonsai techniques. It won't be as challenging as it is for Bonsai since a tree has lot more power to re-grow and lot more vigor.

 

Edited October 6, 2021 by tree_stumps

[openspaceman]

On 04/10/2021 at 11:03, Vedhoggar said:

Australian Pine and Corsican Pine will tolerate chalk and limestone as will Western Red Cedar. 

I was extracting on a chalky hillside today and took this photo of a Corsican Pine (I think)  you will note the yellowing of chlorosis but it is hanging on amongst the dying ash.

 

 

 

I noticed one other corsican in the block so my guess is they were planted in mix with beech in the middle of last century. I expect there was a planting failure of both the beech and the pine and ash took advantage.

 

The beech have subsequently been hammered by squirrel damage but elsewhere on the site is some very nice western red cedar.

 

The ash is badly affected but there are individual trees that show remarkable resistance. Because of this I was keen to remove as many of the plainly dying ash in winter 2019-20 in order to reduce the spore load but this was not done.

[Vedhoggar]

15 hours ago, openspaceman said:

I was extracting on a chalky hillside today and took this photo of a Corsican Pine (I think)  you will note the yellowing of chlorosis but it is hanging on amongst the dying ash.

 

 

 

I noticed one other corsican in the block so my guess is they were planted in mix with beech in the middle of last century. I expect there was a planting failure of both the beech and the pine and ash took advantage.

 

The beech have subsequently been hammered by squirrel damage but elsewhere on the site is some very nice western red cedar.

 

The ash is badly affected but there are individual trees that show remarkable resistance. Because of this I was keen to remove as many of the plainly dying ash in winter 2019-20 in order to reduce the spore load but this was not done.

Difficult to see from photo age of pine but it has got to be at least 40 years old I would have thought. It probably did what it was intended to do i.e. act as nurse for the beech but should have been removed maybe about 15-20 years ago, squirrels need to be controlled as well of course with BE. If CP it will put up with an alkaline soil but less so poor soil conditions. It looks like the whole stand now might be better felled if all like that.

[openspaceman]

17 minutes ago, Vedhoggar said:

CP it will put up with an alkaline soil but less so poor soil conditions

Yes tolerant maybe but not thriving and plainly showing deficiency symptoms yet WRC are doing fine. The site is an SSSI so a bit restrictive with what can be done, when planted it wasn't so.

[Vedhoggar]

55 minutes ago, openspaceman said:

Yes tolerant maybe but not thriving and plainly showing deficiency symptoms yet WRC are doing fine. The site is an SSSI so a bit restrictive with what can be done, when planted it wasn't so.

Expect the plan now is also to phase out the WRC if SSSI? 

[openspaceman]

1 hour ago, Vedhoggar said:

Expect the plan now is also to phase out the WRC if SSSI? 

Yup