willow growing help please

Shop deals on ebay
Advertise with us
shop deals on amazon
Rabbit Talk Forum

Help Support Rabbit Talk Forum:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.
ohiogoatgirl

ohiogoatgirl

Well-known member
Joined
Nov 5, 2011
Messages
1,858
Reaction score
144
Location
Ohio
I have a growing question... we have several huge wild willow trees here. sadly the largest two have had to be cut down the last couple years because the tops were dying and they were so huge and tall dad was worried about them falling on the house in a storm.
the trees were HUGE, like the one stump is big around as a table. like you could easily sit 6 people there and have nice elbow room!!
the other trees are smaller, one even is only big around as my upper arm.

my question is... I want *straight* willow for a project. I will be making darts out of it for my atlatls. so I want to know how I could possibly transplant a small new area for a group of it to grow so I can get straight strong poles for darts and other projects.

thanks so much!
 
If you don't take out those stumps you'll have as many straight shafts as you can possibly use :)
And in about three minutes from a large root system like that
 
really want to get pics of it but I hadn't yet and my camera died ): *sniffles* so until it decides to work again or someone magically gets me a new one I cant...

there is one young one that grew out of the first stump from years ago. I haven't checked the huge stump for new growth in a while though. i'll have to go look.

I know it can grow from cuttings but I've never had it take before.
 
Yea, willow grows with just water, there is no guess work and you can't really go wrong with it.
Just cut some whips, stick into moist, but well draining soil and watch it grow!
 
Secuono":1v9x2xir said:
Yea, willow grows with just water, there is no guess work and you can't really go wrong with it.
Just cut some whips, stick into moist, but well draining soil and watch it grow!
Click to expand...

I think my problem when I tried before was not making the cuttings long enough and at least the base of them be *wood* not stemmy. at least last years growth.

and I think the area needs to be more moist then where i'd stuck em. and I think my dad ignored me and mowed them down.... :evil:

so gonna scout out a good spot and good cuttings and see how it goes.
 
We trim the 2 year old wood off our weeping willow, cut it to 3 foot lengths and stick it in a bucket of rain water with a scoop of poop to make 'tea' and they start sending out roots and shoots within a few days :D

We then plant them in the swampy areas of the property or give them to friends.

But I think ash would be a better choice for straight darts. Willow is VERY light when dry and I cannot see it having enough mass to go straight when thrown.
 
Dood":4j7z7biy said:
We trim the 2 year old wood off our weeping willow, cut it to 3 foot lengths and stick it in a bucket of rain water with a scoop of poop to make 'tea' and they start sending out roots and shoots within a few days :D

We then plant them in the swampy areas of the property or give them to friends.
awesome :) I think i'm gonna cut a bunch and put some in a bucket like you said and some straight in the ground. see how they do.

But I think ash would be a better choice for straight darts. Willow is VERY light when dry and I cannot see it having enough mass to go straight when thrown.
the darts are supposed to be rather light, but strong. the point adds weight. the first video on the atlatl page of my blog explains it better then I can.
Click to expand...
 
Look into Coppiceing
it's where you cut the tree down, and guess what, more shoots appear (actually willow is one that will do it like crazy)
SO, if you dad didn't kill the tree (as in kill it, pour round up or diesel etc.)
Wiki actually has a good article on how to do it in their timber catagory, it's used for Arrow making and bent wood furniture.

England had entire forests that were managed through coppicing
 
A piece of willow trivia: take a bunch of willow cuttings, smash them up, and soak them, Then, soak cuttings of other plants in the water-- the willow water supplies 'rooting hormones' to the cuttings of other plants...
 
Frosted Rabbits":1sah8dka said:
A piece of willow trivia: take a bunch of willow cuttings, smash them up, and soak them, Then, soak cuttings of other plants in the water-- the willow water supplies 'rooting hormones' to the cuttings of other plants...
Click to expand...

I had heard that before :) super cool. I want to try it!

today I cut off some decent pieces and put em in a bucket with "manure tea". will see how they do.<br /><br />__________ Sun Sep 15, 2013 9:40 pm __________<br /><br />cuttings I took on sept 3 have been sitting in the bucket of manure tea the whole time... it is now sept 15 and they don't seem to have sprouted any little roots or anything at all to show they are any different then when I cut them. actually I think a few have all out died /:
 
Well that's weird.

We only have weeping willow, so maybe it's only that species.
We use older branches at least an inch in diameter, rain or pond water, rabbit or old horse manure for the tea and the barrels are along the shaded side of the barn but do get a bit of sun.

I cannot think of what could have gone wrong, usually we have to do a twice yearly clean up to pull out willow branches that have fallen into the pond and have sprouted so we don't have trees everywhere and no water.

Sorry it didn't work out.
 
yes, there are quite a few species of willow. You might wish to get a positive id (with Latin name rather than local common name) for your willow tree. As was mentioned by Kyle I believe, one person's Aspen is another person's Poplar. You can either ask your local cooperative extension agent or take a picture and post it at Dave's Garden plant id and have those wise folks provide you with the Latin name for your tree.<br /><br />__________ Mon Sep 16, 2013 2:04 pm __________<br /><br />It just seems like you either:

a) have a defective willow tree (it won't sprout/root)

or

b) it isn't actually a willow tree.
 
well of the about 15 cuttings i'd had in the bucket I know 4 of them were rooting out. the rest I pulled out because they looked like they were startin to break down really and I wasn't even seeing any white "dotlets" that I saw on the others that turned into roots. 2 of the 3 were goin decently at tryin to leaf out as well.
 

Latest posts

Back
Top