Bare root Ume from George

Horticulture
1

Ryan,
I am getting a Ume from George Muranaka. He’s waiting for it to go dormant to ship it bare root to me. I live in the Chicago area. How do I handle this important cargo at that time of year? I have an outdoor lean-to that I over winter my trees in.
Thanks, Ed

2

I am not Ryan, but i don’t think he responds directly to questions on the forum very often. However, my guess is that he would suggest potting it up with minimal root work and putting it on a heat bead at about 85F (29C). In my experience, trees on a heat bed will dry out far faster than other trees in a winter enclosure and will need water every week or two.

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3

If I’m getting the tree in early dormancy wouldn’t the tree need to rest before forcing growth with heat?

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It is my understanding that the warm roots and cool top encourage root growth without top growth and discourages the growth of harmful soil microbes that tend to thrive in cool, wet environments. The tree is then setup for good top growth in the spring.

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I second what Marty said.

But there is a nuance to it as well. The “Daylight length and ambient temperature are the signals the trees uses for dormancy”…sort of

i have heard Ryan save several times in QAndA’s and livestreams: this is not something you should do every year, it’s for rapid root production that need it.

I imagine it is sort of along the lines of “full defoliation”, you can but there is a risk so… make sure you should!

I also have much less experience than Marty, so if I misinterpreted something please correct me so we can all get better!

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Thanks for sharing your knowledge. Hopefully I could execute the instructions.

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Sorry, but I have one more question. If I keep the Ume in a cold greenhouse would you still recommend a heat pad?

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This is about the level of nuance, where I have less certainty.

With that said…

I go off " the greater the difference between the roots temp (heat pad 83° f) and the air temp ( unheated greenhouse)…size and location of greenhouse would need to be considered to know how much it’s heating up cooling down daily.

But let’s say it’s temperature is ranging between 0-42 degrees most of the day I would say it’s extremely useful still…once you get air temp above 42° I would be concerned with to many signals (root temp/air temp and daylight length) convincing the tree into starting to flush out moving energy from root production into foilage for the false spring this may accidentally be creating…?

Also the closer you get between air temp and root temp the less effective the heat pad becomes (60° air temp 82° heat pad is not going be as beneficial as (30° air temp 82° heat pad) and

from there it’s a risk/reward probability equation that you should do based on the other things in your life a stranger on the Internet can’t factor for!

Hopefully this helps somewhat or someone…somewhere

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Thanks for the additional information, that is very clear to understand.

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