Why I Buy Bare Root Plants Instead of Beautiful Flowering Plants
Your local garden center can be full of inspiration with its rows and rows of abundantly blooming plants in full bloom. Of course, it makes sense that when buying a plant, you’d gravitate toward one that’s full of flowers and maybe fruit. However, bare-root plants are actually a better choice.
What are bare root plants?
Many plants can either be pruned each year and continue to grow or die back naturally. However, the roots are where all of the plant’s energy is stored. Bare-root plants are devoid of branches – instead, they are usually just a root ball of soil. In the case of bare-root trees, they are usually quite young and are little more than a stick with a few roots attached. For example, rose bushes are usually sold in their bare-root state in late winter and spring and are little more than a crown with roots attached and rose branches trimmed to a few inches.
Once you plant rose bushes, they quickly put out new green branches and leaves and can grow quite quickly. Bare-root trees can produce fruit within the first season, and bare-root flowers like dahlias can produce flowers in the first year.
Bare root plants are cheaper
If you take care to plant them correctly, bare-root plants can be a great way to fill a large space inexpensively. Because bare-root plants are lighter and smaller (there’s no soil or moisture to account for), they’re also easier to transport and therefore less expensive. Bare-root trees can be purchased in bulk for a fraction of what you’d pay for a tree at a nursery: bare-root chestnuts bought in bulk can be had for a few dollars, while a potted chestnut with leaves will cost upwards of $29 at a nursery, depending on size.
Bare-root roses can usually be purchased for $4 to $10 each, while a potted rose will cost three to four times that amount. This applies to both bare-root flowers and shrubs. In fact, most nurseries source their bare-root material and plant it on-site—that’s how they make their markup.
It is easier to plant plants with an open root system, and they acclimatize better.
The standard approach to planting almost anything is to want a hole three times the depth and width of your root ball. When you take a plant out of its pot at the nursery, this “root ball” includes all the soil, so it’s bigger, even though the roots aren’t any bigger. Bare-root planting, for this reason, usually means a smaller hole, which means less work.
Planting a bare root plant also doesn’t require much maintenance. It’s wise to soak the roots before planting, and add fertilizer to the water you use to water the roots. However, once it’s time to plant, you simply dig a big enough hole, plant it to the right depth, fill it to the right level, and go.
Bare root plants are also better able to adapt to their environment, and the roots are therefore stronger. When you repot, the plant is stressed, and every branch, leaf, flower, and fruit is another resource-consuming resource. By planting bare root, you allow the plant to focus on root health and grow when it has the resources to do so.
Bare root plants are easy to inspect when they arrive, so rotten, moldy or dried out roots can be easily cut off and any infestations are easy to spot. This is a way to ensure that only the healthiest plants go into the ground.
Where to find bare root plants
The first place you should look for bare root trees is your state nursery, and every state has one. Your state nursery will likely have bare root seedlings or trees native to your state at a low price. Other good sources include Fedco Seeds and Stark Bro’s , which have extensive catalogs to choose from.