3 Tips When Choosing Trees for Northwestern Minnesota Landscape

Whether you plant saplings or mature trees on your property, install trees that can withstand the challenging climate conditions in the Moorhead and Fargo areas. Here are three strategies to help you select the best trees for your residential or commercial property in Northwestern Minnesota and Southeastern North Dakota.

1. Decide on Year-Round or Seasonal Trees or Both

Experts divide trees into two types. They consider a tree a coniferous plant if it stays green all year and reproduces via cones. Trees that are deciduous plants have leaves that change color and drop off before winter.

Choose a row of coniferous trees when you desire a permanent, year-round windscreen. If you plant trees for privacy, conifers are also best.

Evergreen trees that are good for windbreaks and privacy screens include:

Eastern red cedar

Eastern white pine

Ponderosa pine

Red pine

White spruce

White cedar

Fir and spruce fill out along the bottom of their trunks to provide snow accumulation and noise reduction at ground level. Some pines grow leggy with few or no branches at human height. Leggy conifers won't offer privacy at street level when they're mature.

2. Choose Trees That Dazzle and Nourish

Bright green leaves on deciduous trees look wonderful and provide welcome shade during the balmy months of summer. When autumn rolls around, deciduous trees put on a final show of color before losing their foliage.

With proper selection, your landscape trees will put on spectacular fall displays of gold, bright orange, and fiery red foliage. Some of the trees with colorful leaf displays include:

Sugar maple

Red maple

Red oak

Beech

Quaking aspen

Boxelder

Paper birch

Black cherry

Plant a mass of golden aspens or mix and match yellow birch leaves, pumpkin-orange sugar-maple leaves, and crimson pin-oak leaves in the same woodland.

If you aren't sure about which trees to plant for the best autumn color, ask your tree service for recommendations. They'll suggest tree species that thrive in your specific landscape.

Many fruit tree species have lovely fall displays and offer the bonus of abundant produce from your own land. Choose trees including pear, apple, cherry, and red mulberry that feed your palate while they grace your landscape. Nut-producing species including walnut trees provide ingredients for cooking and baking.

3. Pick Trees That Offer Wildlife Sanctuary

If your property goals include attracting wildlife, plant species that are native to the area. In Minnesota, the list of native trees includes 52 species. Both coniferous and deciduous trees are native to the state.

Native trees are welcome sights to local birds, pollinators, and mammals. The native creatures in your area have adapted to the native tree species. Animals and birds find food, nesting materials, and winter sleep spots for many years to come in the native trees you plant today.

Native trees may require specific habitats and soil conditions to survive in the landscape. Some tree species tower above other plants and receive plenty of sunlight. Some trees are understory trees that prefer dappled sunlight and shade.

Trees including willow varieties prefer moist conditions, while cypress and cottonwood trees can take drier conditions. Soil nutrients, pH, and drainage also affect the success of native tree installations.

Your tree service helps you with placement and site preparation for your new trees. Remember that larger trees require deeper digging and advance preparation of the planting site. The results are vulnerable tree roots that take hold in soil more easily. Your transplanted trees have a better chance at survival when you plan well.

Order young or mature coniferous and deciduous trees in the Fargo area by contacting Big Tree Nursery today.