Earth Day - Trees Around My Place

For Earth Day, some people plant a tree, and that's good. There are already trees where I live, so for Earth Day I photographed them.

This evergreen tree and two others have not been doing well. My neighbour
told me that the three trees have not grown at all in the last eight years. I
decided to see what I could do about that. I started with trying to identify
what they were using my National Geographic Field Guide to the Trees of
North America. My best guess is black spruce.

Research on the Internet told me that I can prune the trees any time and
that the trees will benefit from the removal of dead branches and other
parts. As well the trees will improve if they get some fertilizer. I pruned
them and fed them what I have in the way of fertilizer, which was
Miracle Grow and some granular rose bush fertilizer. It wasn't ideal but
they responded. The bright green growth you see at the tops was the
result of that effort.

In the fall I found some fertilizer specifically for evergreen trees and
other woody plants. It's granular, meaning that the nutrients release
over time. It has an NPK number of 10-3-6. I fed them in the fall about
a month before the snow came. As soon as the snow left I pruned them
again and fed them again. I will feed them again in mid July.

This crab apple tree seemed to be doing very well last year until about
mid summer when it started to drop some leaves. It produced much
smaller apples than the year before. I fertilized it with the 10-3-6
fertilizer according to the instructions. I plan on keeping it watered
through any dry spells we may get.

This tree has done well since I moved in and it continues to flourish.
Like the crab apple tree its buds are very prominent right now and I
expect to see leaves any day now.