Volunteers from your neighborhood association have come together to plant a Paul Select Norway Spruce in the Kuhlman Loop. Plans are underway to light the Christmas tree for all to enjoy.
Your donations and membership dues help to make these projects possible.
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Thought would be good to provide the attached watering instructions to the group who helped to plant the Christmas tree. I appears we planted the tree at a very good time since it only needs water if there is no rainfall or snow fall through the winter months. The deep watering and the 2" layer of mulch around the tree will help it to survive the winter.
Watering Instructions.pdf (416.8 KB)
Planting Instructions.pdf (250.5 KB)
Lights should be coming within the next couple of weeks! 
I went up today to check on the tree. The yellowing and needle drop are worse and going up the tree. Some branches are entirely dead and some were broken. I clipped off dead branches. The garden center told me to go ahead and dig back the mulch and apply the root starter although that will be less effective. It wasn’t applied when it was planted.
Steve told me that the original soil was not mixed in with the garden soil. That was a bad choice. The garden soil is rich and porous and in dry spells will dry out quickly. It’s also very acidic and may be too strong for a new tree. My guess is a little of 4 things are happening: transplant shock, over watering, a very strong acid as I could smell manure, and a little rough handling. Evergreens like acidic soil but it can be over done on a new tree, thus the need for the original soil to be mixed in with the garden soil.
The best we can do is hope it does recover although the yellow needles will fall off and the branch will die if all the branch turns yellow/brown.
Steve and I are sort of masters at landscaping, having planted about everything in the world. He has an agriculture degree and taught both ag. and horticulture for a few years. He’s laid back and doesn’t speak up when he should have. I made landscaping a hobby for 30 years. I’ve tried to break the rules to make something grow where it shouldn’t. It won’t work. So trial and error have taught me many lessons.
If it continues to turn yellow and lose needles, we’ll likely need to face the fact that it’s not going to survive. I’ll watch it’s progress. No watering! That’s the first thing that will kill an evergreen: too much water. It’s unlikely we will have a dry winter, so winter months should be wet enough to not require additional water. If it should be dry, water only once a month.
At least we have a one-year warranty if it dies. I’ve asked Sheila to hold onto the receipt. As the yellow is creeping up the tree, it worrisome. The bad news is we picked the best tree on the lot.
Thank you for checking on this Connie. Hopefully it will turn around and start doing better.
Thanks, Connie! What would we do without you? What would we do without all of you? What an awesome bunch we have. Do we need to lay hands on our tree? 
We may need to. If I weren’t so deathly ill, I would go up and try to save a broken branch. I’d need to tie it to the branch above to hold it up and glue it at the junction to the trunk. I’ve saved limbs several times by that method. I use wood glue.
