A Landscaper's View

As plants grow and mature at the nurseries, they either are transfered into a larger container or, if they are a larger plant/tree, their root ball will be wrapped in burlap and tied with twine.  In fact, the burlap root ball is a popular way to grow many different plants but it’s especially effective with growing conifer trees.

Every once in a while, we will come across a tree where the installation landscape company did a half-effort job, leaving the burlap sack tied tightly against the tree truck.  Here is an emerald green arborvitae where the twine and burlap are still exposed a year after being planted.

You can see in the closer shot how tightly the twine was tied against the truck.

It was very sad coming across this silly mistake.  On another customer, we even found a Japanese Maple where the wire mesh was not removed, and after 10 years of stunted growth, was killing the tree.

Always remember to remove the burlap and twine/nails from around the trunk.  It is very important for the tree to have room to grow and blossom.

Here is an excellent description on the what, how, and when on removing burlap from the folks at LawnSite.com:

Remove any nails and especially if there is any rope. The new wire cages have big enough gaps between them that it isn’t necessary to remove them. It’s actually better to keep them on to help keep the root ball together while installing the tree. Cut the burlap 1/3 away from the top of the root ball. I’ve never had a problem with this method. In the old days when they used chicken wire around the root ball it was extremely important to remove it, now the wire is actually made to be installed.