Dead rootball

One of my gardening frustrations is watching a new plant linger and not grow. I dig a proper hole, deep and wide enough. I pour gallons of water on the plant to keep it alive during a dry hot summer. Four months later, the plant is the same size as last spring or it finally dies!

What went wrong? I dig it up. What I see is a root system which did not grow into good soil in the hole (photo). A friend asks, “did I explode the roots”. He has seen this problem many times at his nursery/ landscape business. He took action. His objective: “no plant, annual, perennial, shrub or tree, goes into a container or planting hole without exploding its root ball.

He uses a brick to bust apart the soil (media) around the root ball. His objective is two-fold: first, to break apart circling or potentially girdling roots; and secondly, to shake off as much soil that the plant is growing in. His goal is to coax new roots to venture out into the surrounding soil in the hole. Some landscape gardeners use a butcher’s knife to slice apart the root ball. He uses a brick.

When purchasing plants from late spring thru fall, assume that the nursery/greenhouse plants are leftovers that did not sell. Plants on sale likely need to be transplanted. The grower/garden center manager does not want to expend time and material to repot it. The grower is passing that chore along to you at a discount price.