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Top Tree Picks to Add Value to Your Landscape · Talking Trees with Davey Tree

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_01: Welcome to the Deby Tree Expert Company's podcast, Talking Trees.
• 0:05
  SPEAKER_01: I'm your host, Doug Oester.
• 0:06
  SPEAKER_01: Each week, our expert arborists share advice on seasonal tree care, how to make your trees thrive, arborists' favorite trees, and much, much more.
• 0:16
  SPEAKER_01: Tune in every Thursday to learn more because here at the Talking Trees Podcast, we know trees are the answer.
• 0:23
  SPEAKER_01: I'm joined today by Ryan Gustafson.
• 0:25
  SPEAKER_01: He's a district manager in the Southwest Metro Office, Minneapolis, for the Debut Tree Expert Company.
• 0:32
  SPEAKER_01: Today we're talking about adding value to your landscape and top tree picks for your home.
• 0:38
  SPEAKER_01: Hey Ryan, how's it going?
• 0:40
  SPEAKER_00: Doing pretty well.
• 0:41
  SPEAKER_00: How are you doing today?
• 0:42
  SPEAKER_01: Good.
• 0:42
  SPEAKER_01: I can't wait to pick your brain.
• 0:44
  SPEAKER_01: Top tree picks.
• 0:46
  SPEAKER_01: So adding value.
• 0:48
  SPEAKER_01: How do we add value by adding trees?
• 0:51
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, you know, it's kind of the curb appeal thing.
• 0:54
  SPEAKER_00: Um, having mature trees on a property um adds to the property value.
• 0:59
  SPEAKER_00: There's just a lot of research around that of having a well-landscaped yard which includes um mature trees and um just gives a tree that much more value.
• 1:09
  SPEAKER_01: Well, we always say right tree, right place for your top picks.
• 1:14
  SPEAKER_01: How do you come up with your top picks for for what you would plant?
• 1:18
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, just kind of like you said, right tree, right place.
• 1:21
  SPEAKER_00: So it depends on you know where someone wants to plant a tree, um, if it's a good site uh for that can handle a large tree or if it needs to be a small tree, um, and kind of what their goals are for that tree.
• 1:34
  SPEAKER_00: If they're looking for a screen, maybe you want an evergreen versus a deciduous tree.
• 1:39
  SPEAKER_00: Um, so there's a lot of factors that kind of goes into the right tree.
• 1:44
  SPEAKER_01: You know, you have such depth in in your knowledge of trees.
• 1:48
  SPEAKER_01: Do you get clients that that just say, I want something different?
• 1:53
  SPEAKER_01: I I just I don't want the same thing everybody else is growing, and then you can dip into that uh wealth of knowledge.
• 2:03
  SPEAKER_00: Uh not often enough.
• 2:05
  SPEAKER_00: Uh most people, you know, they love their maple trees, they want their fall color or they want a nice flowering tree in the springtime.
• 2:12
  SPEAKER_00: Um, I try and steer people the best that I can for um when I can.
• 2:17
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, but occasionally we'll get the people that are open to kind of whatever I throw at them.
• 2:23
  SPEAKER_00: That's what I would want.
• 2:24
  SPEAKER_01: When I when I'm talking about planting a tree, I talk about this all the time.
• 2:29
  SPEAKER_01: I have a declining oak forest, and so I'm always looking to replace those oaks with something cool, something different.
• 2:37
  SPEAKER_01: And that's the fun part for me, sitting down with the arborist and kicking ideas around because you guys, it's trees, trees, trees.
• 2:46
  SPEAKER_01: And and that knowledge is invaluable.
• 2:49
  SPEAKER_01: Let's talk about a few things that you like to plant when you find the right place.
• 2:56
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, um, one of my favorite trees that I don't get to plant enough is uh the American larch or tamrak.
• 3:04
  SPEAKER_00: Um, you know, they're they look like an evergreen, they have a shape of an evergreen where it's the nice pyramidal form, uh, but they drop their needles every single year, uh, so they turn a nice bright yellow in the fall.
• 3:17
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but over winter they look like a dead spruce tree in your yard.
• 3:21
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but they put out a nice new flush of growth each spring.
• 3:25
  SPEAKER_00: Um, you know, they can tolerate urban conditions pretty well.
• 3:29
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and I just don't see enough of those, but they're they're great trees.
• 3:33
  SPEAKER_01: How big does it get?
• 3:35
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, they can get pretty large.
• 3:37
  SPEAKER_00: Um, you know, they you know, probably 60, 70 feet tall.
• 3:41
  SPEAKER_00: And then if you know, if you have one individual, it can spread out pretty far, you know, probably 30 foot spread as well at the lower canopy.
• 3:50
  SPEAKER_01: Does it have a nice bark to it, like a Don Redwood, or is it something different?
• 3:55
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, it's kind of a nice flaky, kind of has a reddish tint to it here and there.
• 4:01
  SPEAKER_01: Man, that sounds like a cool tree if he had the space for it.
• 4:04
  SPEAKER_01: That's that's a that's a great one.
• 4:06
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 4:06
  SPEAKER_01: You know, of all the when I ask arborists about this, I rarely hear about the larch.
• 4:13
  SPEAKER_01: And so that's that's great to hear.
• 4:16
  SPEAKER_01: What kind of other stuff are you thinking about?
• 4:19
  SPEAKER_00: Um, you know, another one that I like but needs the right spot is uh catalpa.
• 4:25
  SPEAKER_00: Um they have big, beautiful white flowers in the springtime, kind of later than most other trees that flower in the spring.
• 4:31
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but they produce really big seed pods um that are really long and can create a mess.
• 4:38
  SPEAKER_00: So it takes the right person to want to plant one of those in their yard.
• 4:43
  SPEAKER_01: I'm so glad you brought that tree up because I had one right outside our back porch growing up.
• 4:50
  SPEAKER_01: Those flowers are really beautiful.
• 4:53
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 4:54
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 4:55
  SPEAKER_00: And the in the right spot, those catalpas can get huge, bigger than a lot of the other trees in this area.
• 5:02
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, actually, whoever planted this catalpa back in you know, 1959 or whatever it was, it was too close to the house, and it had started to push up the concrete floor of the porch.
• 5:15
  SPEAKER_01: But boy, we loved that tree, and yes, I know that not everyone's going to want to deal with those seed pods, but as a kid, yeah, it was so cool.
• 5:25
  SPEAKER_01: Did you ever see one that was infested with that worm, that catalpa worm?
• 5:30
  SPEAKER_01: It it will defoliate it in a season.
• 5:34
  SPEAKER_00: Uh I don't know if that is an issue up here in Minnesota.
• 5:37
  SPEAKER_00: I haven't dealt with that in my 20 years of experience here.
• 5:41
  SPEAKER_01: Well, it they were the best worms for fishing.
• 5:45
  SPEAKER_01: Oh nice.
• 5:47
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, catalpa.
• 5:48
  SPEAKER_01: I'm so glad you brought that up.
• 5:50
  SPEAKER_01: And and you know, even when you grow up with a tree, sometimes you forget about it.
• 5:57
  SPEAKER_01: And I did forget about that catalpa.
• 5:59
  SPEAKER_01: I did, I actually was traveling and saw one growing somewhere, and I saw the flowers, and I was like, oh, that's familiar.
• 6:06
  SPEAKER_01: And then I saw the leaf shape, and I was like, oh, this is a catalpa.
• 6:10
  SPEAKER_01: That's so cool.
• 6:11
  SPEAKER_01: Um, when we're talking about adding value to the landscape by planting trees, you know, there's all sorts of other issues too.
• 6:21
  SPEAKER_01: There's the uh the shade and uh, like you said, the beauty, the curb appeal.
• 6:28
  SPEAKER_01: How did you get into this?
• 6:30
  SPEAKER_01: That this whole tree business, how is it right for you?
• 6:34
  SPEAKER_00: Um, I sort of fell into it like most people in this industry, you know, that it's not well known.
• 6:42
  SPEAKER_00: Um, so I went to school at the University of Wisconsin-Stevens Point or college and knew I want to do something in natural resources, but didn't know exactly what.
• 6:52
  SPEAKER_00: And my first year I kind of looked around at different, you know, like wildlife management, fisheries, traditional forestry.
• 7:01
  SPEAKER_00: And uh a friend in the dorm said, Hey, you should come to this Student Society of Arborture meeting, and they talked about tree climbing and switched my major to urban forestry and never look back.
• 7:14
  SPEAKER_01: When we're talking about adding value, what should we not plant?
• 7:19
  SPEAKER_01: I'm gonna throw you for a loop with that question.
• 7:21
  SPEAKER_01: What should we not plant?
• 7:23
  SPEAKER_01: What what what is out there that's like when somebody asks you about it, you're just like, please don't plant that.
• 7:30
  SPEAKER_01: Please don't plant that.
• 7:31
  SPEAKER_00: Uh for me, it's uh spruce trees.
• 7:35
  SPEAKER_00: Um in Minnesota, especially, um, you know, everyone loves the blue spruce, uh, Colorado blue spruce.
• 7:42
  SPEAKER_00: Um, they love the blue color, um, but there's so many insects and diseases that affect those that, you know, once they start getting to a nice mature full size, they just start declining.
• 7:55
  SPEAKER_00: Um, you know, I guess I'm in the business to care for trees and trying to keep them healthy, but I'd rather just not plant them and not have to deal with them uh in the long run.
• 8:05
  SPEAKER_01: Good advice.
• 8:07
  SPEAKER_01: How many blue spruces have you seen that that have, you know, like you said, got to a certain size and just they're done and they're so big, and and if you get to them too late, you can't climb it to cut it, and uh it's a pain.
• 8:22
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah, it's too many.
• 8:25
  SPEAKER_01: When people are asking for a maple, is there a is there a certain type of maple that you prefer uh when we're when we're talking about this subject?
• 8:35
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I I really like the sugar maple, um not only because I make maple syrup, but um, you know, they're kind of the the true hardy maple.
• 8:48
  SPEAKER_00: Um they're not fast growing like a silver maple, they're a little bit slower growing um and not as many issues that way.
• 8:55
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but also like there's a few different varieties of uh red maples up here in Minnesota that do pretty well.
• 9:03
  SPEAKER_00: Um I try and avoid you know autumn blaze maples uh just because they have really poor structure, um, but they are kind of bulletproof if they don't fall apart in storms.
• 9:13
  SPEAKER_00: Uh like you know, they can grow just about anywhere.
• 9:16
  SPEAKER_01: You know, with the sugar maple, you get a little further south of where you guys are.
• 9:21
  SPEAKER_01: We're starting to worry about if it's gonna get too warm for them.
• 9:27
  SPEAKER_01: It's it's too early now.
• 9:29
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, we still we can plant sugar maples, but you intrigued me with making the maple syrup.
• 9:36
  SPEAKER_01: How like how many trees do you have to do that?
• 9:38
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, you've got to get a lot of sap to make the syrup, right?
• 9:42
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, uh, I just do it in the backyard.
• 9:45
  SPEAKER_00: Um, my neighbors have uh, I think like five sugar maples that I've been tapping for a couple years, and that's enough more than plenty to keep my family full of pure maple sheer pure maple syrup all season long.
• 9:59
  SPEAKER_01: And if you've never had it, folks, nothing that compares to the real thing, right?
• 10:04
  SPEAKER_01: Absolutely.
• 10:07
  SPEAKER_01: Can you make can you can you use other maples or is sugar maple the one that that's that's the one to use?
• 10:14
  SPEAKER_00: No, you can use any maple, um, even box elders, because they're they actually are a maple.
• 10:19
  SPEAKER_00: Um, so there's a lot of people that they only have box elders, so they top tap box elders and make maple syrup.
• 10:25
  SPEAKER_00: Um it's just the sugar maple has the highest sugar content.
• 10:30
  SPEAKER_00: So, you know, I think the ratio is like it's 40 gallons of sugar maple sap boiled down to one gallon of syrup, where like a silver maple or something might be 50 to 60 gallons of sap to make one gallon of syrup.
• 10:45
  SPEAKER_01: Is it a big deal in the neighborhood or are they just kind of used to it and wait for their jar of maple syrup?
• 10:51
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, they're used to it by now.
• 10:52
  SPEAKER_00: Seeing me out in the driveway boiling sap down every spring.
• 10:57
  SPEAKER_01: So tell me some other trees that you were thinking about discussing today.
• 11:02
  SPEAKER_00: Um, you know, I I know oaks have been struggling with a a few different issues.
• 11:07
  SPEAKER_00: I still love, you know, the burr oaks.
• 11:10
  SPEAKER_00: Um swamp white oak has been kind of the popular one the last you know five to ten years um that a lot of cities are planting and stuff like that.
• 11:20
  SPEAKER_00: Um and then another one, it's gotten pretty popular.
• 11:25
  SPEAKER_00: What I'm uh Kentucky Coffee Tree is another good one that doesn't have many issues and grows pretty well in the urban environment.
• 11:32
  SPEAKER_01: Well, let's talk a little bit about Kentuck, Kentucky Coffee Tree, because again, that's off the beaten path, but man, what a what a cool tree and what a tough tree.
• 11:41
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, absolutely.
• 11:42
  SPEAKER_00: And uh, you know, kind of the same with the Catalpa, they have big seed pods um that look like burnt tacos, basically, is how I was taught in school.
• 11:53
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but they do have varieties now that don't produce the seed pods for that reason.
• 11:59
  SPEAKER_01: Do you think if you have a landscape and you're putting in trees like that, of course, we know right tree, right place?
• 12:05
  SPEAKER_01: If I had a catalpa and a Kentucky coffee and something else a little bit off the beaten path, I see that as a real positive in the landscape, something different.
• 12:17
  SPEAKER_01: Um, but how do you view that?
• 12:21
  SPEAKER_01: Do you do you agree with that, or do you think, like, oh well, I guess it depends on the person.
• 12:25
  SPEAKER_01: Some people are gonna come look at that property and say, I want my maple.
• 12:30
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, um, I yeah, I think again, kind of right tree, right place.
• 12:34
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, if your goal is to have like uniformity, like saying you're trying to create a screen hedge or like an along a driveway and you kind of want something similar, um, you know, you can try and get some variety in there um of similar-looking species.
• 12:50
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, but I think variety is good as you know, we've learned, maybe didn't learn from Dutch Elm Disease, um, but are learning from Emerald Ashbor that having all of the same tree isn't the best thing because you could lose them all at once once that disease or insect comes in.
• 13:08
  SPEAKER_01: Anything else on your list?
• 13:11
  SPEAKER_00: Um, you know, up here in Minnesota, it's a little bit colder, so our palette of trees is isn't as wide as uh if you get, you know, just a few hours south of us into you know Iowa or southern Minnesota or yeah, southern Minnesota.
• 13:26
  SPEAKER_00: Um you know, we are it's nice that some of the cities around here, like Minneapolis, plants a wide variety of stuff, so we kind of watch them as to what they plant, what survives, what doesn't do good.
• 13:37
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but another one is um sycamore.
• 13:40
  SPEAKER_00: Um we're starting to see a lot more of those um up here in the Twin Cities.
• 13:46
  SPEAKER_00: Um, there are some that are probably like 60 years old and are huge, so we know that they do pretty well up here.
• 13:52
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but they're just starting to make a comeback in the nurseries up here in the Minnesota market.
• 13:58
  SPEAKER_01: Um, let me talk to you about sycamores because I I need to figure this out.
• 14:02
  SPEAKER_01: Is a is a London plain tree and a sycamore the same thing, or are those two separate things?
• 14:09
  SPEAKER_01: Because they to me they look the same.
• 14:11
  SPEAKER_00: They're two separate things.
• 14:12
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 14:13
  SPEAKER_00: Um yeah, I don't we don't have them up here, so I don't know the whole history of them, but um the sycamore is native to the United States here.
• 14:23
  SPEAKER_00: Um again, someone might fact check me on this, but and then London Plain is um you know from overseas from uh you know very similar but just different native ranges.
• 14:36
  SPEAKER_01: For people who might not know about a sycamore, that's another beauty.
• 14:41
  SPEAKER_01: That's just another beauty.
• 14:42
  SPEAKER_01: And they do get big.
• 14:44
  SPEAKER_01: Talk a little bit about what that sycamore is going to look like in 10, 15 years.
• 14:49
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I mean, they can get 10-15 years, uh, they grow pretty fast once established, but um, you know, they can, you know, at maturity they can get up to probably like 80 feet tall, if not taller, and they have nice big scaffolding limbs um and are just amazing trees.
• 15:07
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, but you know, that 10 to 15 years after planted, you're probably looking at like a 20-foot-tall tree.
• 15:15
  SPEAKER_01: And I assume it's a very hardy tree because down here in Pittsburgh, they're all over the city.
• 15:21
  SPEAKER_01: They're growing, they're growing everywhere, so it can take, you know, urban conditions.
• 15:27
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah.
• 15:29
  SPEAKER_00: The the one thing uh you know to be careful is planting it near a driveway or something like that, because they can, you know, the roots can push up driveways and concrete and stuff like that.
• 15:40
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, as you said, they they get huge.
• 15:43
  SPEAKER_01: But once you know what one is, when you see one, you're like, wow, that's that's pretty.
• 15:50
  SPEAKER_01: You know, that that that bark.
• 15:53
  SPEAKER_01: Anything else on the list that we need to talk about?
• 15:57
  SPEAKER_00: Uh for like a smaller growing tree, uh, my favorite is probably the red bud.
• 16:03
  SPEAKER_00: Um, you know, nice heart-shaped leaf, uh, purple flower in the springtime, uh, pretty hardy tree.
• 16:10
  SPEAKER_00: They have varieties uh that grow up here in Minnesota and do pretty well.
• 16:15
  SPEAKER_01: Boy, you uh in doing the podcast, there's been a lot of talk about red buds.
• 16:21
  SPEAKER_01: People seem to really like the red buds, and I always ask about these fancier varieties or unique varieties, uh maybe forest pansy.
• 16:33
  SPEAKER_01: There's one I I I saw, I've never seen it in person, flamethrower, uh, but but I've just seen pictures of it, and it it like the foliage has kind of like different colors and such.
• 16:43
  SPEAKER_01: But whenever you're kind of reaching that way, you never you'd want to I'd want to see it growing somewhere first before I put it put it in, you know, because we know like a native red bud, if it gets established, it's gonna be there.
• 16:58
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah, exactly.
• 17:00
  SPEAKER_00: And yeah, these varieties um they sound really cool and in the right if they grow, they look really cool, but yeah, they can sometimes take unique situations to be able to fill in and do well.
• 17:14
  SPEAKER_01: Tell me a little bit about that.
• 17:16
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, because you're always seeing these new introductions, and I'm sure people at the nursery are like, hey, check check this out.
• 17:22
  SPEAKER_01: But before you put it in someone's yard, you gotta know what it does, right?
• 17:29
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, absolutely.
• 17:31
  SPEAKER_00: Um you know, when my consulting arborists in my office, you know, I talked to them a little bit about you know, not looking through the catalog and trying to recommend every single cool species out there because the next year we might be having to replace a bunch of trees.
• 17:47
  SPEAKER_00: Um, so trying to look for those.
• 17:50
  SPEAKER_00: Um, you know, we have the University of Minnesota Landscape Arboretum, um, which is a great resource just to go out there and check things out.
• 17:57
  SPEAKER_00: They plant a wide variety of stuff and see what's growing well and what's not, and um, just kind of doing some research before you recommend a bunch of different crazy stuff.
• 18:06
  SPEAKER_01: Isn't it fun though to go out there and see something that's been you know in the field five years, maybe a little longer, and see that it's thriving and say, oh, I can put this on my list.
• 18:18
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, absolutely.
• 18:19
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 18:20
  SPEAKER_01: Anything else small tree-wise, we should think about?
• 18:23
  SPEAKER_00: Um, I mean, there's always crab apples, um, but with those, there's a lot of diseases, so just you know, there's a ton of different varieties of crab apples, and there's a lot of disease-resistant crab apples out there, so selecting those versus the ones that get apples scabbed really easily.
• 18:41
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I'm always talking about that on the podcast too.
• 18:43
  SPEAKER_01: I got a got a crab tree, it's on it, crab apple tree, it's on its way out, and I I still want a crab apple there, but it's gonna have to be a like you said, a newer variety, disease resistant.
• 18:57
  SPEAKER_01: I I hope I hope I can find one that's disease resistant and has double flowers because I've seen a couple, I've seen a couple crab apples that have those pretty double flowers, and I'm a sucker for doubles, but then I worry about what we talked about like will it be tough enough?
• 19:15
  SPEAKER_01: Will it get apple scab?
• 19:17
  SPEAKER_01: Uh should I take a chance on a on a place where I've had a crab apple there for 30 years that I've been looking out the window at, and it's just it's it's it's done, it's finished.
• 19:27
  SPEAKER_01: This is its last season.
• 19:29
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 19:30
  SPEAKER_01: And that's that's a lot to think about.
• 19:33
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, absolutely.
• 19:35
  SPEAKER_01: That's why we need certified arborists to consult with over this sort of thing.
• 19:40
  SPEAKER_00: Yep.
• 19:41
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 19:42
  SPEAKER_00: Because it we see it all um as far as insects and diseases, and we know which trees get hit hard and which ones don't.
• 19:49
  SPEAKER_01: All right, Ryan.
• 19:51
  SPEAKER_01: Good stuff.
• 19:51
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, I loved your tree selections and certainly loved hearing about the catalpa again.
• 19:56
  SPEAKER_01: That brings back so many memories.
• 19:58
  SPEAKER_01: Thanks for your time.
• 19:59
  SPEAKER_01: I'm sure we'll talk again soon.
• 20:01
  SPEAKER_01: All right, thanks, Doug.
• 20:03
  SPEAKER_01: Ah, the majestic catalpa tree.
• 20:05
  SPEAKER_01: Look it up.
• 20:05
  SPEAKER_01: You might love it like I do.
• 20:07
  SPEAKER_01: Now, tune in every Thursday to the Talking Trees Podcast from the Davy Tree Expert Company.
• 20:12
  SPEAKER_01: I'm your host, Doug Oester.
• 20:14
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• 20:17
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• 20:20
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• 20:23
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• 20:29
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• 20:34
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• 20:36
  SPEAKER_01: And as always, we'd like to remind you on the Talking Trees Podcast trees are the answer!