North Wales St Asaph Tree Nursery

Denbighshire County Council’s Local Provenance Tree Nursery at St Asaph grows 24 native tree species using stylish Air Pots™, and so can you

On the Bionet Wales website, we can read about how St Asaph focuses on using local provenance seeds and cuttings of native trees.
With the help of volunteers, they propagate tens of thousands of plants for environmental restoration projects. They adhere to the DECCA framework, emphasizing species diversity, extending natural areas, improving conditions within an area, and connectivity between areas to enhance ecosystem resilience and promote natural recovery.

In this Denbighshire Freepress article, the nursery is estimated to be growing up to 70 acres worth of plants.

Check out those pots

To state the obvious: anyone can and probably should have a go at this themselves at home.
No special equipment is needed, any old tree seed lying around the place will do, just add water and watch it grow.
It doesn’t need to go anywhere. You can give your tree a name, pour Albert a drink, have a regular fun old time together on the patio, and post the highlights on the ‘net for clout: that’s what life has always been all about, as long as anyone can remember.

Enjoy growing trees responsibly.

But! For any serious grower who wants an excellent tree either to transplant, or to keep in the same pot for as long as possible, those Air Pots you see in the first picture above are worth checking out.

  • A simple plastic pot is great for holding soil, but the roots simply go round in circles inside it, eventually girdling themselves.
  • A true fabric pot (not plastic mesh-fabric) will air prune the root system, and can wick water up from the base, but they have a shorter lifespan for reuse.
  • A sturdy Air Pot™ gives the roots great air pruning, can be reused almost forever, and is slightly harder to water if you are not using a professional.
  • Both types of pot really benefit from a proper irrigation system.
  • The traditional alternative to an air pot is for the diligent grower to snip the ends off the roots at least once a year, usually repotting into a larger pot at the same time.

We don’t use Air Pots™ on our nursery, mainly because we are bareroot specialists and a retail nursery.

But if we were a project-based tree nursery like St Asaph, or a home grower who wanted to grow some really nice Oaks or Maples from seed, we would grab ourselves some air pruning pots, both fabric and Air Pot™ style.
Fabric is reasonably good value for money; the sturdy Air Pots™ are more expensive, but you could make them yourself from simple building materials.

Make Your Own “Airy Pots”

The go-to plastics for plant pots are coloured HDPE (PE-HD) – the colourless milky white stuff isn’t common anyway, but it’s no use under the sun, and Polypropylene, PP.

If you search for Plastic Dimple Drainage Board and check the material, you’ll find those plastics are typical.
Then all you need is some chicken wire, cable ties or similar, and some sweet friends to make the work pass easier.

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