~ June 12, 2023

The month of June is off and growing at the nursery! In the field we have crews split between pruning, staking, weeding, and watering. Despite the ongoing drought across the state, the trees in the field are putting on tremendous growth. We are keeping one crew dedicated to watering our new liners. More about the drought in our recent blog post here: Drought Conditions Across Illinois

The main focus of our pruning these past few weeks has been Oaks. We started by un-staking 2nd & 3rd year trees, letting them “flop” around a bit, pruning the tops to reduce canopy weight, re-staking as needed. Because of these extra steps, Oaks take the most time of any genus we grow. Here is a link to some videos & posts from previous seasons about our Oak pruning process:

• Pruning Oaks
• Growing Oaks at SGN Trees

Our Oak blocks currently look AMAZING! We couldn’t be happier with the crops we have coming on for the next few seasons. Here are a few video clips of our staking machine in action over the last few years. Becky’s Dad built this custom staking add-on to our tractor. It has staked thousands of trees over the years for us and works perfectly for what we need!

• Staking SGN Oaks Video 2023
• Staking SGN Oaks Video 2022

For more videos throughout the season, check out our Instagram page @springgrovenursery

Besides working on Oaks, we have been busy pruning and staking in other tree blocks as well, like Maples, Honeylocust, Crabapples, Baldcypress, and Elms. Eventually every tree in the nursery will get some special attention. And since it is June, the “Juneberries” (AKA serviceberries) are ripe & delicious! We have enjoyed snacking on them while out and about in the nursery.  We have already made some yummy serviceberry crisp and jam! These tasty treats made us wonder about the history of Serviceberries. Here is a fascinating blog post Maggie put together about this important tree in our landscape: The History of Serviceberry Trees

In between field work & serviceberry snacking, we are loading and shipping out trees daily.  We have over 1000 trees available for planting projects, and they all look healthy and fresh – ready to plant & grow! Check out our SGN Photo Gallery for some updated pics of trees in our above ground SGN Sales Yard:

• SGN HOLDING YARD PHOTO GALLERY 2023

The first day of summer is quickly approaching, and we are looking forward to the longer days and slower pace that summer brings to the nursery. Hopefully a rainy stretch will kick in soon, but until then our crew will stay the course and keep watering as needed. Summer is a beautiful time to visit the nursery. The crops for this fall and next spring are starting to take shape, so it’s a perfect time to think about the next planting season and lock in some beauties from our field. We welcome you to visit us anytime this summer!

Here are a few images from around the farm this past month: