It is widely recognised that planting trees too deep is a major cause for premature decline.

Tree roots need both oxygen and water so inevitably they grow within the top metre of the soil. We tell customers to plant our container trees an inch proud of the soil line to allow it to settle back into the freshly dug hole. Better to plant too proud than too deep.

Root balled trees are a real challenge. Cultivation and root balling in the field heave soil up the stem so that they sit several inches too deep to start with. Nurseries who containerise root balled trees pile compost on top of them and then landscapers use root anchors to stabilize them at planting. I reckon most root balled trees are planted at least 5 inches too deep and this is the major reason for failure further on down the line.

When we lift our trees from the field and containerise them, the top of the first root is no more than a centimetre under the compost level and for customers who specify, we then paint a line at the point the root flare leaves the compost. For the customer, if they can’t see this paint line after planting, they know it is planted too deep!

We call this ‘The Barcham Line’

Posted by Mike Glover

Pruning large and mature trees requires a lot of thought! A severe prune in winter will take off all the flower buds for the next spring which in turn dismisses all chance of enjoying the rewards of fruit in the autumn. It can also trigger a strong reaction of new season growth which then produces loads of flower and fruit two seasons down the line. The tree can then get in the swing of this cycle and develop a condition called biennial bearing, i.e. fruiting every other year.

To get full sized fruit every year you can try the following. Flower, and so fruit, is borne on the previous season’s growth so when pruning you can reduce this by half for the tree to concentrate on less, but higher quality, fruit during the spring and summer. Fruit development is also enhanced by increasing the levels of sunlight in the canopy. A dense headed crowded crown will shade out fruit development so when pruning keep this in mind and let the light in through the middle.

For a tree to generate fruit it must be well fed. A general purpose feed in the spring just before bud burst can build the trees nutrient levels at a critical time to enhance fruit size and taste.

But this is not an exact science! An ill-timed spring frost can wipe out all best laid plans and wipe out fruiting potential for the year and force the tree into a biennial bearing cycle of nature’s doing! Also, on the odd occasion when nature allows you to do the perfect job, birds, insects and rodents can play their part to ruin your crop. In a garden environment where the tree is also grown for its ascetic beauty, pruning is a last resort when you are unhappy with shape or you have to tame a supersized tree that is growing beyond its space allowance. He firm rule is to prune deciduous trees when they are dormant and leafless in the winter and evergreen trees in March / April, just before they start to wake up for the spring.

Posted by Mike Glover

We often get asked this question and it is certainly true if you are taking delivery of root balled or bare rooted trees. Trees delivered in this form are like fish out of water and it is generally recognized that up to 70% of the trees root system is left behind in the nursery field after lifting. The bigger the tree and its root system, the more roots are dislocated and the more repair work the transplanted tree has to do for it to survive. Trees sustain themselves with water and nutrient through root hairs on the extremity of the root system and these are the roots that get left behind.

This is why we containerise our trees! Broken root systems are repaired over the following growing season for us to deliver an unwounded product that is geared for rapid and sustained establishment from the off. What is more, this is the reason we can guarantee our trees for our customers, we supply trees with roots attached! Our patented Light Pots are renowned to provide you with a great root system and have revolutionized the way trees are supplied in the past 20 years.

So going back to the original question, “Do smaller trees catch up larger trees if planted at the same time?” the answer is no, not if it’s a Barcham Tree! Our trees grow away at the same rate despite its starting size. When planning a garden it’s always nice to the initially mix sizes to give the landscape a random naturalness. When uniformity is required for avenue planting, trees ordered at one size will grow away at the same rate for a great long term effect.

Posted by Mike Glover

Imported pests and diseases are rife among UK trees, but there is a solution!

With an explosion of foreign tree imports in recent decades, the Arboricultural industry is now reaping what it has sowed. Ash dieback, the Oak Processionary Moth (OPM) and the pine moth caterpillar are just a few of the unwelcome visitors to the UK, forcing Government importation bans and costing Defra a fortune to police. OPM is a significant hazard to human health, causing severe respiratory reactions, and will cost authorities at least a six-figure sum to control in London alone this year.

But does it have to be that way? Mike Glover, managing director, explains how we collect seed from veteran trees across the UK each autumn:

‘I have a simple rule when choosing seed—always look at the parent. One of my favourites is a superb English oak in Northamptonshire. If it looks this good after 700 years nature is telling me all is well!’

‘Whether it’s English oak from Northamptonshire and Windsor, holm oak from Norfolk, sycamore and beech from Gloucestershire, birch from Wales or alder from Scotland, we believe there should be an emphasis on home grown trees. ‘British trees are best suited to thrive in this country and, by growing trees in this way, the threat of pests and diseases entering the country is negated,’ Mike enthuses.

But trees are a long-term business and there is always demand for a greater diversity than our native range. Significantly, the topic of tree importation and the protection of woodland became a topic of discussion in the House of Lords earlier this year. Barcham Trees was singled out for trying to tackle these problems by introducing its own quarantine system for all imported trees. ‘We don’t import trees and sell to customers for immediate planting—instead, we hold all imported trees on the nursery for at least one full growing season. During this time, they are monitored by professionals and outside agencies such as Defra,’ Mike elaborates. It may not always be practical to look at the parent, but knowing where our trees have come from means we can enjoy a full range of beautiful specimens without unintended and potentially disastrous consequences.

For our biosecurity policy please follow the link Biosecurity

Welcome to the first, I hope, of many production blogs. My name is Warren Holmes-Chatfield and I am the Operations Director at Barcham Trees. In production it is our job to do the growing and maintaining of our trees in our distinctive white bags.

We are coming to the end of a busy period on production where we have been potting our new intake of field grown trees. This process starts in October and finishes around the end of April. The nursery really starts to fill up very quickly at this time of year especially when we start potting our large container trees.

Once potting is complete the next big operation for us is pruning of all the stock, this takes place all through the summer months. Starting with the pruning of oaks, moving onto cherries at the start of spring and on it goes through the hundreds of varieties that Barcham Trees grows.

Of course water is very important to the crop and we always emphasize this when you buy your trees from us, water is extremely important in the first 18 months of the trees life once it is planted out. In March we will start to get our irrigation system up and running. Irrigation tanks are filled from our 11 acre reservoir which was filled up during the winter months with 16 million gallons of water, that’s a lot of baths!! Once this is up a running the computer system delivers water and feed to all of the 120,000+ trees across our nursery and the growing season truly begins.

Posted by Warren Holmes-Chatfield

If you watch a mature tree on a windy day you will notice that whilst all the outer branches are moving, the centre trunk is still. The tree canopy is defusing the energy of the wind to protect its centre from rocking out of control. A tree with a lot of space around it develops a mature and well developed crown so is better equipped to defuse strong winds whereas trees grown close together rely on each other to do this as alone they are weaker with thinner canopies. In a dense copse, the trees on the outer edge are the strongest as they have grown having to withstand prevailing winds and if they are removed the weaker ones in the middle can soon blow over, deprived of their protectors.

Think of a large tree with an established root system as having the same dynamic as a lovely red wine glass, with a wide bowl supported by a thin stem and wide base. If you put such a glass on a table, without wine, and try and blow it over you won’t be able to. However, put a pencil on its end and you can blow it over no problem. Trees grow with a similar stability. Wide rounded crowns, a slender trunk and a wide shallow root system make them mechanically very strong.

Multi stem trees have a low centre of gravity so are the best equipped to withstand the strongest winds. Feathered trees, i.e. with branches all the way down the trunk, are also stronger than lollypop shaped trees. I never forget walking passed a Pinus nigra Austriaca (Black Pine) on a stormy day on the Norfolk coast, as when I was under its protection the air was completely still with all of the tree’s branches and needles diffusing the strength of the wind.

At Barcham, we grow our large trees at wide spacing to make them strong. If our trees can withstand our fen climate they will be fine when planted in your garden!

Posted by Mike Glover

I’ve been growing trees for 28 years and I saw something that I have never witnessed until today.

Prunus serrula Tibetica (Tibetan Cherry) is always revered for its bark but against a low winter setting sun it is an amazing site to behold!

Good as a multi stem or single stem specimen tree, if you place this in the garden with this sun angle in mind you will not be disappointed

Posted by Mike Glover

The amount of times I hear the word ‘quirky’. It can apply to behavioural characteristics for both people or animals, or even houses and events. For me, ‘quirky’ is a desirable trait, something different and interesting from the normal.

And you guessed it, quirky is derived from the Latin ‘Quercus’ or in our language ‘Oak’. The haphazard but beautifully shaped crown of our iconic mature English oak, such a feature to our countryside, is what we refer to each time we use the word. It implies tried, tested and unique, much like this beauty that I harvest acorns from every other year in Northamptonshire. This tree was around and thriving when Richard 3rd was born at Fotheringhay Castle in 1452 which coincidentally is less than 2 miles away from where it still grows today!

I always point out to my impressionable kids that most things in life always ends up, or starts, with trees!

Posted by Mike Glover

Following on from a House of Lords debate in January bemoaning the introduction of new pest and diseases coming into the UK from companies importing trees from abroad, we are saying that it doesn’t have to be this way! Every October I collect seeds from veteran UK trees that have a proven history and providence. The acorns I collect are from specimen trees over 300 years old and they are planted in seedbeds the day after I harvest them for best germination results.

Seedlings emerge in the spring and are left to grow on for a year before being pricked out into containers the following winter to develop their root systems for a further growing season.From there they are planted into our field unit to grow on for another 4 years before being lifted and containerised for sale as an instant impact tree to provide beauty or privacy screening for gardens across the breadth of the UK.

Always ask where your trees are coming from! 9 times out of 10 they will be imported, sometimes with nasty ramifications. Oak Processionary Moth, which can hospitalize people if they inhale their projectile hairs, was brought into the UK by importing nurseries. This pest will cost London over a six figure sum to combat next summer, all because of lax biosecurity. It is possible to reverse this trend by buying from British growers who don’t factor in trees from abroad for immediate resale and who would rather put the time in to do the job properly!

Posted by Mike Glover