Expert: nick mccann - 4/24/2010

Question
I have many seedlings that have taken root around my house.  They have come from a Japanese Maple tree in my front yard.  Many of the seedlings are scattered among the Lilly of the Valley that is on the northern side of the house.  My question:  when is the best time to transplant these trees and how big should they be before I transplant them?  My grown children would like to have some for their yards.

Answer
Once they have several leaves on them they are ready for transplant, the key here however is how you lift them, be certain that you take a sizable amount of soil with the seedling and do not disturb the roots "at all"; once you lift the entire plant with undisturbed soil attached, immediately put it in a pot with additional soil and carefully back fill the soil around the root ball (again the root ball being the seedling with soil attached..). Now you only need to give the entire pot a good watering, and then fill the level of soil back up (it will have settled after watering..), and thats it. When your kids are ready to plant it in the ground, follow the same exact procedure, but let the roots expand for a couple of weeks in the pot so that when it is popped out of the container to be put in the ground, it will come out as a nice compact root ball with undisturbed roots,...I can't emphasize enough, the importance of not exposing and disturbing the tiny roots on the seedling.