Pond Boss Forums INTRO Questions & Observations Pine trees...........

For 12 years or so, I have been planting mixed conifer packets as these are the cheapest way for me to acquire 1' to 2' seedlings. They include equal numbers of White Pine, Scotch Pine, Austrian Pine, Blue Spruce, Norway Spruce, and a 6th species that I can't for the life of me remember right now. Survival rates, best to worst, have been: 1) Scotch Pine and Norway Spruce, 2) Austrian Pine and Blue Spruce, 3) White Pine, and 4) ??? Species (perhaps you can see why it is not foremost in my mind). Deer predation is not the only hazard these seedlings have faced, but survival drops off the farther the trees are away from neighbor's houses and the trees by the pond (which have no close neighbor presence) are eaten on the worst, so I feel the deer are harder on them than anything else.

This year I experienced a new form of deer damage; there were buck rubs on a couple of the Spruces which broke off branches. But as a deer hunter, that's kind of neat in itself. I think both affected trees should survive but will have to see how they do in 2006 to really know.

My personal favorites are the Scotch Pine and the Spruces; I find Austrian Pine kind of homely. But for my purpose of hiding the neighbors from my view, all of them will work. (It's hard to be master of all you survey on only 43 acres.)

45 years ago my Dad planted most of these same species in a border around his back yard, so I have some long-term opinions based on his experience. The Spruces do grow the slowest (I would say Blue is slower than Norway), and lose relatively few branches. White Pine grows by far the fastest and, having very soft wood, loses a lot of branches. I get called into Dad's at least twice a year to cut up large (up to 10" last year) storm-dropped branches with the chain saw; they are always from his White Pines. Scotch Pines Dad planted which were in the shade died; ones his next door neighbor put in which got lots of sunlight did very well and probably fell in between the White Pines and the Spruces in terms of growth rate.

All of these trees of course drop predigious amounts of needles which are pretty acidic and preclude almost everything from growing well underneath the trees. Personally, I would not want any of them growing at the edge of my pond. Since the needles do not seem to blow as far as leaves dropping from deciduous trees, conifers planted back aways from a pond probably put less organic matter into the pond than maples, oaks, etc.