Hello and thank you for your time.

First off I am very novice and I appreciate any help. We had a memorial spot for my mother-in-law with a Flowering weeping fountain tree. It made it about two years and I dug it up to replace with a new order. It did ok for those two years but this year there was no life at all, complete brittle. I was able to pull it out of the ground. I am thinking that it had bad drainage and the roots just set water logged.

Here is some details:
Our yard has a lot of clay
I live in the Charlotte, NC growing zone.

I just ordered a 5-Gallon Weeping Yoshino Cherry Tree to try in that spot. Currently the hole is about three feet wide and 2.5 deep.

Any advice would be appreciated such as should I plant it more like a mound since so much clay, level to ground, watering tips...anything would be appreciated.

On another topic I also ordered an Autumn Moon Japanese Maple we are planning to keep in a pot before putting in the ground maybe in a year or two that is 3-gallons.

Any tips on how to give these trees their best chances would be greatly appreciated.

I've included some poor night time pics to show the soil. My apologies.

Post some daylight pictures when you next have a chance.

If you have poor drainage in your planting site, then your best choice is to create a "raised" situation with the crown (root flare at the base of the trunk) higher than the surrounding soil elevation. You should not dig the hole deeper than the root ball or container depth of the plant you are installing anyway. A 5 gallon pot is NOT 2.5 feet deep.

A very wide loosened soil situation is very good to establish a new plant. A very deep loosened soil situation is not particularly useful.

great info and a reason I am glad I


asked. My plan was to fill this space with good soil and honestly I wasn't sure how deep I needed to dig for a 5-gallon tree which is why I wondered about the mound.

I'll send better pics tomorrow as well, thank you for your time

Is the area around the planting hole paved or is that gravel?

That is gravel