Baby Blues by Rick Kirkman and Jerry Scott for November 02, 2023

Always dig a hole twice as big as you think you’ll need.

Holy cow!

Measure twice, shovel once.

Darryl! Have somebody tip the tree. Slide the spade under the root bundle. Tip the tree back up. Pull the spade and the tree over to the edge of the hole. Tip the tree again and slide the spade out. Tip the tree back up. Rotate the tree out over the hole until it falls in.

Alternatively, get two or three other people to help you lift the tree and lower it into the hole.

Lazy.

He shouldn’t have used a metric shovel to dig the hole.

Isn’t it a bit late to be planting?

Pick yourself up, dust yourself off, start all over again.

https://www.youtube.Com/watch?v=AGUsRGuZb6k

My husband is a wiz at measuring by eye. One time he was building a rail fence for his HO layout. He took a thin piece of balsa and started snipping what looked to me at random. However, every vertical post was exactly the same height and every horizontal, while longer than the verticals, were exactly the same length.

He needs Wanda’s help.

Dig a twenty dollar hole for a five dollar plant. Scale accordingly.

Measure twice, dig (cut) once.

Measure twice and dig once

A 5 gallon tree is the sweet spot. Still relatively easy to dig a hole. And studies have shown that this size tree actually grows faster than 10 and 15 gallon trees.

Alas, Darryl isn’t much of a handyman, let alone a gardener or arbor-est. But he does have good intentions.

Sort of related: In one of my College Data Processing Classes, part of our final grade was to plan out some sort of process for a business (Inventory, Accounting, etc.), that they could use a Computer for. Most students went to some local business for their Project, but I went with a Process to estimate how long a given Project would take, or alternatively, how much it would cost. The “Bottom Line” of my Project was to make your best estimate, then multiply it by 2.5. In the years following, I applied that and it was always much closer than the “Best Guess” estimate…

Come on, Darryl. Even I could tell that tree ball wasn’t going to fit. ;D

Darryl, that hole may be big enough for your brain, but not that tree.

Not totally. Yest continue to dig. You’ll get it right…..

Once had to dig 2 holes in the 90’s for cherry trees around the time I accidentally killed a nasty rooster I gently swatted with a broom stick when it flew up at me with its spurs. I dug one of the holes a little deeper and threw the rooster in it before the tree. The “chicken cherry” is still alive – the other one didn’t last 5 years.

Try measuring the ball.

I was thinking about putting out a tree this month. Thanks to this strip – I think not.

And don’t forget to remove the binding around the root ball. Unless of course, you want a dead tree next spring.

Switch to a bonsai.

Not Banzai!—-bonsai

Many things which I attempt — unless I am very well familiar with how to do it — I find it is best to allocate three times the amount of time I expect to take plus buy enough materials for three failed attempts.

As the man who started Stark brothers nursery a hundred years or so ago used to say, “Dig a 10 dollar hole for a 5 dollar tree.” Prices have gone up, but the advice is still pertinent.

You definitely need a much bigger hole.

Obviously you were wrong Darryl.

Didn’t realize it was going to be that heavy, did you?

But do you know?

She is training to be snarky for life

Around here with the heavy clay soil it’s twice as wide and one and a half times as deep as the root ball. Mix compost 1/2 and 1/2 with the native soil, toss in some organic starter fertilizer in the mix. Be sure to break up the roots if the rootball is tight. Back fill, the top of the root ball should be just slightly higher than ground level because it will settle.

If it’s ball and burlap like the comic then cut the twine and trim off excess burlap. I have always removed all the burlap but sometimes there aren’t strong enough or enough roots to hold together.

B&Bs are plants that have been grown in the ground then dug up and wrapped.

Honey, please go into the house and bring back a tape measure for Daddy. Thank you!

Apparently you have to take off the wrappings, even if they told you you didn’t need to

Haha! (＾▽＾)