The Tree Experiment, Part 1

 So! As you may know, I'm a sucker for trees and plants in general. What you may not know is, I'm also a bit of a mad scientist. While most of my "experiments" involve trying to grow plants as cheaply as possible (I.e. through seeds, clippings, and just finding things growing in ditches), I'm also dabbling in the "training" of trees...to be my minions.

An "Espaliered" tree - from Deep Green Permaculture

Y'see, horticulture isn't just about the anal-retentive pruning of roses and trimming hedges into bunny rabbits; it's essentially the world's first bioengineering. Things like grafting, coppicing, forcing, and Bonsai have been used for thousands of years to exploit the natural growth patterns of plants for human purposes. Coppicing, for instance, turns one valuable timber tree into a whole "grove", as shoots grow out of the stump and eventually become new trees themselves. Bonsai involves limiting tree growth through strategic pruning of both branches and roots. Grafting, one of the most ancient and miraculous practices, implants the branch of one species or variety into another, rooted tree (rootstock), since unlike we meat-people's jealous organs, plant parts are pretty much interchangeable.

Om nom nom...from Now That's Nifty

The one practice I'm interested in here is called "training" - encouraging a tree to grow a certain way through pruning and binding. That's how you get "twisty" ornamentals, or the espaliered pears that grow like vines on lattices. It's a bit strange (even Lovecraftian), but quite frankly a plant is perfectly fine growing along a path of least resistance, and trees already do weird things like "swallowing"
derelict cars and fences.

My "experiment" uses two different, very "plastic" trees to perform two different functions. They will take years to complete, but should I pull this off I'll be a bonafide mad tree genius. Without further ado, here are my projects:

Project 1: Remote Boxelder Parasol

Problem: The southwest corner of my house receives too much sun in the summer, turning my bedroom into an oven. I want to plant a tree for shade, but once it gets large enough to provid practical shade, its roots will span the space between my house and my neighbor's, potentially attacking our foundations.

Solution: use an existing boxelder (Acer negundo) stump sucker to run horizontally along the property line, then vertically to create a new "tree".

If you've ever dealt with a boxelder stump, you know the damn things don't quit. They'll sucker until you completely dig up the stump, and even rudimentary roots will still sucker for years afterward. I've commented before on the sheer, stone-stubborn resilience of these "junk" trees, which will continue to grow even after falling over or cracking nearly in half.

My boxelder, stretching from the metal post to the left of the
image (apologies for the terrible photo, my phone lens is cracked).

So my plan is to hack this feature of the boxelder to train it, in such a way that it runs horizontally along the property line until it's directly in front of the west Wall of my house. I've taken the closest sucker and tied it down with soft rope, hopefully without restricting its growth. In the meantime, I've been pruning extraneous branches and suckers so that all the plant's energy goes into the sucker tip. You see, plants are a little like the starship Enrerprise: energy can be shunted to different areas: shoot growth, flower/fruit production, root propagation. Clip off new shoots, for instance, and energy is shunted toward root growth. Selectively take off older leaves, and flower production is prioritized. Cut off one branch, and the remaining branches grow more vigorously. Some plants, like lilacs, require drastic pruning every few years, or they begin to die off. It's a fascinating and powerful system that allows plants to dominate their environments, by hook or by crook; and by using our brainpower we can harness these systems to our advantage.

Experiment 2: Remote Mulberry Hedge

Problem: I want to create a thick, luscious hedge of mulberries in my backyard, both for myself and for the birds. Unfortunately, mulberries (like other fruit trees) can take 10 years to fruit. I'm still shaky on my grafting, and finding the correct rootstock can be difficult and time-consuming.

Solution: use the suckering ability of an existing, fruiting mulberry tree to train into a hedge.

My mulberry stump, showing the buds
sprouting from the trunk.

This one's even more involved - though no less wacky - than the boxelder parasol. It may be a complete bust, as it relies on a dozen variables to pull off. Essentially I want to train a sucker from a mulberry stump I cut down in February to create a lengthy hedge.

This one also takes advantage of a tree's impressive suckering ability: mulberry are relentless suckers,
putting out masses of long, bushy twigs from their trunks even when healthy. The stump I cut in February is already budding, and I'm confident I'll have several sturdy new branchws by month's end. My scheme is to form an "arch" with a resultant branch, in such a way that I can mow under it, then have it bifurcated and run along the fenceline. The resultant trunk will then sucker itself, and by selective pruning (spaced 3-4' apart) I'll have a line of little "trees" I can then interlace and make a hedge out of. I'm basing the projected sturdiness of my hedge on the fact that some of the mulberries in my yard bear nearly-horizontal 20-30' limbs; growing a limb along the ground takes away any weight restriction.

Will my experiments work? Only time will tell! Stay tuned...