Hello all,

I've recently been appointed to a campus master plan committee at the college where I work in southern Idaho. We have a long walkway lined with ornamental pear trees. The trees do very poorly, with 3-5 replacements necessary per year out of about 70 trees. They have been in place for about 15 years. We suspect that they do so poorly partly due to the high alkali soil (maples, sweegums, etc. do poorly here too) and, with their shallow roots and height, we have also lost several to wind. We are considering removing these trees, perhaps on a replacement basis. Does anyone have suggestions for appropriate replacement species? Ideally the replacement would have deeper roots, greater hardiness, a similar columnar shape and height.

Thanks in advance,
Steve

Idaho? ....

Several climates there.

But off the top of my head, I'm thinking - hornbeam. Or columner hornbeam.

Carpinus

That would be a nice walkway tree. Photos should not be hard to come by.

It's kind of formal looking.

By the way, I used to be involved in campus landscaping at the University of Portland and the Oregon Health Sciences University.

Now I'm in business.

Feel free to swing by http://www.mdvaden.com

You may get a kick out of a few of the prewritten topics relevant to trees, roots, soil.

M. D. Vade of Oregon

Oregon Coast Album - http://imageevent.com/mdvaden/oregoncoast