Planting depth advice (with photos)

General Fruit Growing
#1

Hi! Thank you so much for all of your help.

Today I planted the first trees for my Belgian Fence I’m attempting. It’s apples and pears, 2 ft on center apart, in a small raised bed to get them above our tough Texas clay (and lawn).

Picked up these bare root trees from Bob Wells today and got them in the ground, however, I have no clue if I got the planting depth correct. I read you want to get the soil line at about the top of the root spread area. Is that correct? I also read it’s better to be too high rather than too low. The hardest part for me was the fact that the nursery gave me the trees with wet sand all around the roots so I could NOT tell how deep they used to be planted!

ESPECIALLY with the gooseberry, which is the last photo. I have no idea how deep to go there. Could not see any sort of line.

Would you change anything? If I messed it up can I go retry tomorrow? I’m planning on doing the 16-inch prune tomorrow as well.

Bonus question - are viable tree buds supposed to look rather inactive during dormancy? I see all the ‘potato eyes’ on the stem but they just sure look dormant right now…

Images:

[Album] imgur.com

Thank you!

#2

looks good to me.

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#3

Hard to tell but probably ok on that picture.
I agree it can be hard to tell how deep to plant bare root plants.
As for the buds - I wouldn’t worry too much. As long as the tree is alive it will push growth regardless.

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#4

thank you @poncirusguy and @TrilobaTracker, I will keep the trees how they are! thank you for the input. hoping for a miracle here in Texas and a productive backyard landscape!

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