Old Red
Posted in Antiques on 12/25/2010 01:41 am by adminHow to dig around an 8 year old red bud tree?
We lost a very loved pet today, and we want to bury him under our pretty red bud tree. But we're worried if we might harm the tree if we dig into it's roots. What can we do?
Sorry about your pet.
While breaking roots does hurt the tree, a few small roots won't do much harm. The roots of a tree generally go out below ground as far as the leaves to aboveground, and sometimes further, so you'll probably hit some.
* Don't dig directly at the base, but a little bit away from the trunk. The further away, the less chance of finding really big roots.
* If you hit small roots (more than a pencil or smaller) you can break them or dig around them. Really big roots (1 inch) you should consider moving your hole a l ittle to the side around them. Your tree is pretty established at 8 yrs, so a little breakage is OK and probably unavoidable.
* Breaking / cutting roots in half is probably better than scraping tearing or stripping them.