Collected American Hornbeam

[W3rk]

End of Winter update on this Hornbeam. About two weeks ago I went all in on down sizing for a re-pot. And I learned why it was so damned heavy - when I collected it and first potted this I had largely left it in it's original soil, which was very much just clay.

Two years in that and it couldn't have seemed happier. Afterward:


Bare rooted it and saw just how cool and crazy the roots were.


Before for a pot size comparison for the down-size.

 

[Leo in N E Illinois]

Really nice trunk.

when you collected the tree, if you had hosed out the clay before potting up you could have cut the roots off where I put the red line, leaving a very flat root system. I hope as you repot in the future. you will try to head toward this. Once the initial collecting is done, if you don't do the radical root work right away, years later, it is more difficult afterwards to drastically reduce the root system.
New roots will pop on the backside as you reduce the root system. Just keep that nice nebari buried until you have a good radial root spread. Keep removing more and more of the lower part of the root system every time you repot.

 

[Brim Gribley]

absolutely gorgeous! , what type of soil did you initial pot it in?

 

[W3rk]

absolutely gorgeous! , what type of soil did you initial pot it in?

Thanks, I got pretty lucky with this as a lot of what's great with the trunk was buried in an embankment. The first potting after collection I left it in a lot of its' original soil - pretty dense/clay and filled the pot with a lot of calcined clay. I was new and afraid of being too aggressive. That last repot I really cleaned the clay out and used a mix of DE and other random stuff? It'll be another 2 years out next spring so I'll likely get into another repot then.

 

[Brim Gribley]

Thanks, I got pretty lucky with this as a lot of what's great with the trunk was buried in an embankment. The first potting after collection I left it in a lot of its' original soil - pretty dense/clay and filled the pot with a lot of calcined clay. I was new and afraid of being too aggressive. That last repot I really cleaned the clay out and used a mix of DE and other random stuff? It'll be another 2 years out next spring so I'll likely get into another repot then.

Thanks for the info, can't wait to see more of it's progression!

 

[W3rk]

Long overdue updates. I was able to layer off a nice section of the main trunk and cut the trunk back: